Jump City - Doomsday
by obsidian dreamer
Summary: How strong the hurricane from a single flap of a butterfly's wings? For better or worse some days change the course of history, and for the stalwart protectors of Jump City and their extended kin these are the tales of those days. One-shot AUs including crossovers, thus far mostly BB-centric but hopefully more to come...
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Okay, life is still frenetic and I have very little time to think about anything not related to the following; ticks, research into ticks, tick-parasitised species, tick-borne illnesses, health and safety, environmental health, the importance of public health initiatives in improving workplace safety, accident reporting and/or my regular job. However, after seeing me relax a little over Christmas, one of my cousins' children set me a challenge for the New Year to keep me in the writing groove for when I have time to focus on my longer stories and series – yes I haven't forgotten any of my works, even the earliest ones, but I need time to focus on them once all this studying and work is finally over, hopefully by the end of 2018. Until then, though, this is my rising to the challenge I'll detail in the end authors note – hope you enjoy what you read sprout…

…and everyone else in the audience as well of course.

So, curtains up and the show's on the road!

 **Jump City – Doomsday**

"You're doing it again."

"Wha, no I wasn't," even half-asleep his denial was instinctive, "nothing happened, I plead the Fifth to… uhh, whatever you said." Cheek pressed into the pillow Raven wrestled down a laugh as her other half finally reconnected brain; _or whatever he's got in place of it – not now Rude!_ ; to body, the gentle but reassuring heat on her forearm dissipating as he released her,

"Sorry mama, I didn't mean to." Shaking her head slightly at the nickname she had just about come to just about tolerate over the years; _not that we can tell him, he'll make fun of us – you really think he'd do that Timid, after everything? – uhh… - go back to sleep, we'll all be fine I promise – okay, but be careful_ ; she pulled the green hand and arm over her body,

"I know Garfield," from the annoyed whine she mentally pegged them even in name-related ripostes, "even after all this time I don't know why."

"I'm sorry Rae", and he was, she could feel the emotion blanketing his normally so cheerful, reassuring presence like an oil slick over water before it was pierced by something sharper and spicier, "my hand just knows what it likes, and I agree." Despite herself the sorceress snorted, pressing her body backwards so his arm draped over her side, the verdant green of his skin bright against her charcoal grey,

"Can't think why," she muttered, squeezing the back of his hand to let him know she really didn't mean it, "and anyway it's never been a bad thing, not after what started it all…"

Hearing her voice trailing off Garfield Logan, better known by his aliases Beast Boy and later Changeling, said nothing, actions speaking for him as he hugged himself over the half-demon for a heartbeat before looking over her shoulder and down, the now-revealed mark on her right arm black and foreboding as the pair reminisced the day of its branding.

XXX

It had started out so simply; alarm, sit-rep of a break-in at a technical store downtown, hear their fearless leader let out his battle-cry, quick bet with Cyborg about who the culprit was and shift into a hawk to get there. Shoulder to shoulder with Starfire above the city his first reaction to the unmistakable hulk slouching through the broken window with an entire desk-full of electronic equipment slung over one shoulder was depression; _guess Tin-head's going first on Mega-Monkeys 8 tonight…_ ;

"The Five from HIVE," the bubbly voice jerked him out of his funk as Starfire's eyes gleamed jade, "they will not escape a good kicking of butts!" She arrowed down, her first bolt springing into existence just as one of the villains caught sight and shouted a warning followed by a barrage of mini-missiles,

"Aw no, it's those goober-brain Titans!" Taking this all in and memorising were everyone was Beast Boy folded his wings and dived after his extra-terrestrial friend.

The shape-shifter would (reluctantly) admit he wasn't the smartest of the team but at the same time he often thought some the criticism he received, especially from the resident bird-brains of Titan Tower, was unfair. No matter how often Robin impressed upon him the importance of surprise or how many snarky quips Raven delivered regarding his animal forms they had no idea what it was like to live with the instincts of the beasts he fought as. Telling him to suppress them was like telling an ordinary person not to blink then shining a flashlight in their face – possible but not easy – and because of those instincts Mammoth kept his eyes, the piercing shriek of the bird of prey giving just enough time to throw his free arm over his face. Beast Boy felt his talons sink in and forced his psyche to dominate that of the bird, foregoing rending with his beak in favour of flying up and shifting again, the impact of his silverbacks' double-axe handle to his crown leaving the muscle of the Five cratered on the ground. The anamorph had no time to savour his victory, however, vaulting over a beam of pink energy as the rival team leader emerged from the now-ruined storefront; slamming his fists into concrete, the youngest Titan had to resist the urge to beat his chest in challenge as the hex-mistress rolled her eyes,

"Oh come on really," Jinx complained, casually ducking under a star-bolt and retaliating with a swift incantation, "we just wanted an easy score, why'd you do-gooders have to ruin it?" Neither of the two Titans on the scene bothered answering with words, instead pressing the attack before the H.I.V.E. regrouped – until back-up arrived he and Starfire were outnumbered even with Mammoth down, a situation that became even more apparent as a number of identical evil-doers began spilling out of the crime scene like ants from a kicked nest.

 _I hate clones_ ; of all the criminals that infested or threatened Jump City there were none, in Beast Boy's opinion, as outright annoying as the Naruto-wannabe Billy Numerous. His self-replicating powers meant that most of the Titans' normal attacks couldn't contain him unless they hit the original (or Billy Prime, as Robin had insisted on labelling him) or forced him to exhaust himself, both tasks he and Starfire were ill-equipped for. Though his larger forms sent hordes of spandexed teens flying in ways to make a mace-wielding, ring-wearing dark lord envious eventually numbers told and Beast Boy was borne to the cold cement to be subject to Billy's other annoying feature; the guy just didn't shut up,

"Any other tricks snot-ball," the villain taunted, unaware that the literal tiger he had by the tail was about to turn into something else; _now what – aha, perfect_ ; "just give us a second and this dog-pile will put you do… huh? Ahhh!"

"Shocking, isn't it?" Beast Boy spat as he returned to his original form, the clones that had had direct contact with his torpedo ray form convulsing as they levitated away, "Thanks Rae-Rae!"

"Raven," the other hero growled back as she casually smashed the clones together, forcing them to disappear and hopefully giving the original a headache, "remember that."

"Your wish is my command mama," snapping off a quick salute towards the skyborne sorceress the skin-wearer swept across the battlefield and began to plan with both instinct and higher thought. With Raven on the scene and Mammoth still picking himself up things were a lot brighter but Jinx wasn't stupid; she'd left Starfire to Gizmo and, he suspected from the energy blasts and shields being raised, See-More as well to engage the newcomer. Pouncing on a few nearby Billy clones Beast Boy was working out the best way to reinforce Starfire when a screech of tyres announced the cavalry arriving.

Robin was in motion even before his cycle stopped, birdarangs flying towards the densest knot of Billy clones he could see to thin the herd as the distinctive whine of Cyborgs' sonic cannon charging up filled the battlefield,

"Say hello to my little friend," the robotic teen snarled as it fired, pumping his first as See-More reeled away, energy shield overwhelmed by the onslaught, "I was meant to be puttin' new breaks on my baby right now and I'm takin' out on your hides!"

"Bring it barf-magnet," Gizmo challenged, rising above the confusion on his mechanical legs – Cyborg needed no further invitation and charged, Beast Boy at his shoulder and his eyes fixed on where Mammoth was shaking his head woozily; no matter how tough the oldest of the Five was, he wasn't going to walk off a bison charge to the gu…

Beast Boy never finished that thought, nor did he and his best buddy and bigger brother finish the charge, stumbling to a halt as the noise rolled over the miniature warzone. Before he was consciously aware of it the changeling had recognised the noise and was moving towards it, every animal instinct demanding his reaction as everyone else stood rooted to the spot as the sound of soul-rending torment drove spikes of terror deep into their minds.

XXX

 _This is not good – I hope Gizmo's got the bugs worked out of the anti-tracking system_ ; the short genius had assured them all his patented no-trace formula would work against the would-be Terminators' scanners and the dog-boys' nose; now that Bird-Boy was here and co-ordinating the fight, she and her team had to hope he was right. Though she trusted the other ex-Academy students both in a fight and, some of them at least, as friends Jinx was smart enough to know that the H.I.V.E Five were unlikely to come out on top against the Titans unless they had help, picked the battlefield or got spectacularly lucky. Individually the Titans were stronger, even Robin and he didn't even have metahuman abilities, and their team work was usually top-notch despite the supposed friction between members. _Must be nice to be the darlings of the city_ ; the hedge-sorceress groused, back-flipping over black-wreathed projectiles and retaliating with condensed ill-fortune; _training gear, all the equipment you need, a permanent address – easy to be good when money's no object_ ;

"Come on crow-girl, give us a smile" hiding her internal conflict with a grin and a twirl Jinx beckoned her opponent with one finger at the same time as press a button on her belt, hoping against hope her radio batteries hadn't gone dead, "or would that make your face crack?"

Raven said nothing; she seldom did in Jinxs' experience; but as a nearby streetlight blew the hex-caster reckoned she'd annoyed the much more powerful magic-user somewhat, which was both a good and bad thing; good in the fact that by focussing on her Raven was more likely to be blindsided by the escape plan she was whispering over the Fives' short-wave radios, bad in the fact that until said plan came together she was squarely in the cross-hairs of the irritated cambion. Hoping her opponent would somehow stumble from the misfortune that surrounded her; a trait that, unlike her pink-tinged meddling in probability she was unable to really train but came in handy anyway; Jinx cartwheeled away and made to slow her opponent down with another minor curse; ironically, it was only because she needed to aim such a malediction that she was looking at Raven when everything changed.

The rival mage, cloak billowing and eyes shining white with power, seemed to suddenly freeze in the air, not a hair rippling as her chant was cut off mid-flow; even as the idea that she'd swallowed a fly or something flashed through her mind, Jinx instinctively realised this was nothing she had done. For an endless second she was witness to the Teen Titan static, shock etched into her face and the seemingly-limitless power Jinx envied dying behind her whitening eyes, then there was a flash of fire, the grey girl threw back her head and oh dear God the _scream..._

Every drop of blood in Jinx's body shrivelled to ice; her legs froze solid, vision paralysed as the floating girl was wracked by something obscene and agonising. Raven's forehead, the jewel Jinx had assumed was to do with some religion or other, was burning, a point of brightness in the charcoal of her brow and fire was spilling across the girls' face; dimly aware of explosions and lashing shadow tendrils all about her the villainess couldn't move, couldn't tear her eyes from the other girls' expression. It was somewhere between shock, anguish and otherworldly excoriation, whatever magic that was causing it shrouding her in shadow and… her stomach dissolved, the taste of bile flooding her lips as Raven's entire figure was swallowed by the darkness, illuminated only by four molten red eyes where once there were two white and burning runes she couldn't and didn't want to read snaking across her body, and still the scream echoed.

Yet beyond the noise and far away from the terrible spectacle, even as uncontrolled limbs of utter shadow smashed all about them in uncaring fury and every pane of glass within eyeshot shattered Jinx heard another voice, an almost silent whisper in the back of her mind that scared her more than anything, because the thought that Raven might beg for anything was a step too far even in this world gone mad,

" _Get away,_ " the disembodied voice pleaded, echoing the desperation and despair Jinx had seen graven into the aloof Titans' face, " _can't, stop… clear, city –_ _run!_ "

The shadows bulged and the terrible redness, the vestigial proof that Raven still existed as a separate entity to the black, began to sink into nothingness – despite herself, despite every instinct screaming at her to flee Jinx shuffled a half-step forwards, fingers twitching towards the ebon mass above her. She didn't like Raven; _though God knows I'm not alone in that – hell some of her own team don't like her sometimes_ ; but just before her eyes had sunk into hellish pits they had locked with Jinx's own and the fear and pain within them struck hard at the pink-haired girls' primal humanity – the hex-caster wasn't heartless and no-one, not even a grey-fleshed warlock of supposedly-demonic origin, deserved to feel like that. But Ravens' presence was fading as was the echo of her cry and, mercifully, the mental hold such a macabre performance had seized them all with; Jinx breathed as though she'd run a marathon, trembling as her senses came alive. She was aware of everything, the smell of the air, the reflections of the broken glass shards around them all, the tiny tremors transmitted through the pavement behind her; … _wait, what?_ Belatedly sensing danger she span around and shrieked, instinctively crouching into a ball and shielding her face from the green blur racing towards her like a javelin. All thoughts of luck and magic vanished, only primal reflex allowing her to spit out something that might, by a miracle, deflect the stricken mages' aggrieved team mate,

"That wasn't me!"

Whether he heard her or not she didn't know; she merely counted her frenzied heartbeats until the jade juggernaut crashed into her and she departed her crushed mortal coil. One… two… three… she still lived… four… five… a chill breeze ruffled the tips of her upturned hair, a shadow passed over her and she opened her eyes, spinning back around in time to see a verdant smear throw itself into the maw of shadow and flame and both suddenly vanish, wiped from existence as though they'd never been. In their absence Jinx breathed once, then again, her twin narrow escapes from death suddenly crashing down on her; she swayed teetering on the brink, facing the abyss of passing out before a sudden shout snapped her, shaking and petrified, back to herself,

"What the hell just happened? Jinx, what did you _do?!_ "

XXX

 _Do nothing but think_.

The mantra, driven into his brain by the greatest detective of this and likely any other age, was why Robin led the young superhero team; though merely human, his ability to plan complex operations and, more importantly, change those complex plans depending on circumstances, had let the Titans snatch victory from defeat more times than they could count. So now with two of his team mates vanished and possibly…; _unknown, disregard until you have more evidence_ ; and the H.I.V.E. Five shouting amongst each other and Starfire shrieking and Cyborg standing his ground stunned the protégé of the Dark Knight of Gotham took a breath, broke it all down in his mind and started snapping out his orders,

"Cyborg, Cy," he commanded, locking eyes with the taller teen as his half-metal face tracked over to him, his organic eye wide and seemingly lost in disbelief; _sorry Vic but no time to grieve, we have to act_ ; "scan for them."

"W, What?"

"Their communicators," Robin explained tersely but not unkindly, one eye on the teams' current enemies as the Five, seeing Jinx unhurt, began to calm down, "can you track them?"

"Uhh, yeah, yeah," cursing himself for not already having done so Cyborg activated his in-built scanners and the relief that washed over him when he immediately returned two pings was immeasurable, "got'em, main park, about five blocks over, that way."

"Titans, go!" Even as he said it Starfire was streaking away, a blur of orange and green as she rose above the city after her missing friends. Robin stowed his staff and made to follow only to see Cyborg pace backwards more slowly, arm still trained on the recovering H.I.V.E. as they clustered around Jinx,

"What about…?"

"Leave it," Robin said, coldly but not without feeling as his honed eyes picked out the sorceress's face; he'd heard the words she'd shrieked as Beast Boy had charged towards her and her expression now suggested that, if she was faking it, she was a much better actress than he'd given her credit for, "this is bigger than them."

Cyborg needed no more than that, disengaging his formidable arsenal and haring back to where he'd parked his baby, the Titans yielding the fight to track down their missing friends. Throwing a leg over the T-cycle Robin hit the throttle and roared away, reviewing plans to calm or, worse, disable an emotionally-unstable Raven, the Five already dismissed from his mind.

XXX

They'd won right?

The Titans were gone and they were still here, claiming their prize – to the victor the spoils and all that? Regardless of circumstance they'd run off the designated protectors of Jump City, something few supervillains could boast, and with this haul they should be able to restock Gizmo's sorely-depleted stock of mechanical consumables prior to pulling off other heists – compared to a lot of nights that left them empty-handed, nursing bruises and contemplating bail bills it was a complete success…

…so why were none of them celebrating?

As the noise of thrumming engines faded away the Five swapped glances with each other and the loot they'd dropped to engage the Titans – for a long moment the silence dragged on until, motivated more by a need to be gone before anyone else showed up than anything else, Gizmo took command,

"Get this stuff in the van," he said, his arms already gathering up some of the equipment scattered when Mammoth had been blindsided, "I should be able to scrub it untraceable before the crud-munchers get back. Nice work Jinx, whatever you did put that creepy bitch in her…"

"It wasn't me," Jinx repeated as she finally looked away from the direction Cyborg had pointed; _the sky, it wasn't that red before, was it?_ ; "I don't know what it was."

"Our gain," Mammoth grunted, handing a few bits off to several Billys as the cloner recovered from the mental trauma of being electrocuted, crushed and frozen in the space of seconds, "we gotta go."

"Yeah," the villainess agreed tonelessly, half-heartedly picking at some of the scattered debris, "we, gotta get this aboard and get back to the lair."

Following her example the Five quickly began to package away their ill-gotten gains into the crappy van Gizmo managed to keep alive, slamming the rear doors shut and piling in as Mammoth, the only one old enough to drive, gunned the engine and swung out into the road, their only company a tense, billowing silence as they left the scene of their successful but far from triumphant robbery.

XXX

In the midst of the maelstrom, at the eye of the storm of pain and power she could not even dream to control the last oasis of Raven's sanity was crumbling despite all her emotions being in unanimous agreement over a single fact; _it's too soon!_

She had always known the purpose of her birth and the dark portent it spelt for both Earth and Azarath; she was Trigons' Portal, created to be his gateway into the twin worlds he would despoil and rule for all time. Her demonic father had imbued her with his dread powers of shadow and darkness, strength she had struggled with all her life as it was controlled by her all-too-fragile emotions. Meditation and self-denial, lessons learnt at Azar's monasteries; that was what allowed her to aid her friends, do some good in the world before her cursed blood destroyed it but now that time was over far too quickly. With the last of her control she'd shifted away to the only relatively-remote place she could sense; since then she'd been a puppet in her own flesh, dimly aware of what was occurring as otherworldly forces used her as a conduit from their world to hers.

Skin and soul-self alive with demonic power she was both agonised and surprised it wasn't hurting more, the mystical might of the being she had wrestled with in her dreams now forcing its way through her body; taken completely by surprise by the sudden intrusion, she could not fight back. She could feel Trigons' taint polluting the air underneath where she hung suspended; dimly she felt the barrier between worlds grow thinner, tenuously thin, then she screamed again as something tore through, the act of splitting the boundary slashing through her soul like a knife through flesh. The prophecy was wrong, Trigon had claimed his due before her sixteenth birthday, but why; forcing the breach like this, even when she was all but helpless from the sudden onslaught, must have been taxing even the strength of a being that had slain billions. She was not a willing part of the prophecy, she was being coerced and the rules of magic, rules even her father was forced to obey, took exception to that – to bend them as he was now must have been costing the demon lord dear. _Hurting, father_ ; even here, all but flayed to brokenness, some bitter part of her soul had the strength to sneer; _welcome to my wo-aahhh!_

Existence split apart, the world ceased to exist and reality whited out; as the end of the world was born Raven, the one created with the sole purpose of ensuring such dark machinations would come to light, was consumed by agony and briefly faded away, missing the instant she had been created to bring about.

XXX

 _Okay, what would Robin do?_

In all honesty it was going better than Beast Boy had expected; fair enough he had a menagerie in his head howling to either fight of flee, the girl he had a sort-of-secret crush on was wreathed in red and forming some sort of flaming disc above the ground, but since he hadn't expected to survive his headlong leap after her the fact he was still breathing was an unexpected plus. He never much liked Raven's teleportation; the animal part of him instinctively distrusted it; but after he'd finally realised what he was going to do after hearing the sorceress's scream it was too late to stop. As a pronghorn he had soared clean over Jinx's head; _though why did she look so worried, it's not like I was a triceratops or anything_ ; and morphed again, ignoring her last telepathic words as his fingertips scrabbled at the trailing edge of her cloak. He'd often wished she'd remove the heavy garment, especially in warmer weather when it must have been stifling for her, now he was grateful he'd been able to snag a grip on it and weather the journey to this park.

After they'd reappeared Beast Boy had just had time to determine they were still on Earth and somewhere green, then the law of gravity had been invoked and he'd plummeted to the ground until a hummingbird morph repealed said law. Now on his feet and sizing up the situation, Beast Boy thought for a few seconds and decided his course of action,

"Everyone," in the stillness of the air his voice carried and he tried to sound calm and in control at the same time and break the spell Raven's involuntary; _I hope_ ; magic had cast over them, "the park is now closed."

Despite himself he felt proud as the few people left began to make haste to evacuate the potential blast radius, though as several screams began to ring out the youngest Titan suddenly realised his job of prevent civilian casualties had just gotten harder. Spinning on his heel into a fighting crouch he fought to stop his jaw dropping at the forms now flooding from the portal – unless he was very much mistaken all hell was breaking loose through the wheel of flame Raven had somehow summoned and was still part of. Ethereal forms of flame and violence were bursting into life before the portal, the grass around them smouldering at their touch before beginning to spread out. At the sight of this Beast Boys' instincts and intelligence suddenly snapped together; Jump city was his home, its inhabitants his to protect and because of that he paused only to bellow,

"Everyone away, now," at the gawking park patrons before shifting into one of his most powerful forms and charging into the fray.

Regardless of how tiring it was to use a pre-historic form, Beast Boy was a great believer that everything was better with dinosaurs; whatever these flame demons were, they weren't strong enough to stand up after getting chomped, stomped or tail-lashed by a T-Rex. Luckily it seemed the portal was one-sided and he could hold the horde at the gate, the demons pouring from whatever hell they called home into his waiting jaws as he waded into the throng. Despite the reflexes and outright viciousness of one of his most powerful forms, however, several handfuls of the strange creatures were able to slip past, their forms glowing as they ghosted away from the portal. _Damn it, they could burn down half the city_ ; rising fear was smothered by rage as his jaws snapped another pair of the newly-birthed creatures in half, preventing them joining their escaping comrades; _come on guys where are you, I can't do this on my own!_

Within the rampaging death-lizard the human mind of Garfield Logan was frantically running options at the same time as trying to block out scorching pain and animal hunger for blood. Tough as his fighting form was and though he was giving far better than he got he was only one person and his foes seemed numberless, more emerging from the portal all the time. Only the fact that they seemed to be more interested in getting away from their birthplace than duking it out was keeping him as fresh as he was and it still wasn't enough; more were escaping every moment and that was unlikely to change unless the portal was shut.

And Raven was either casting or, worse, was the portal.

He didn't know much about magic and honestly didn't care; what he did know was that he was going to keep squashing these pathetic candle-flames until someone else could fix his pack-mate because there was _no way_ he was putting Raven at risk just to stop some stupid magic trick. He roared his intent with such force it snuffed out the nearest monster and sent another pair flying back into whatever hell they called home, then he stepped back as something else answered his challenge. Two great hands the colour of blood and tipped with nails like obsidian daggers emerged from the portal and took hold of either side; as the wound in the fabric of reality was torn asunder Beast Boy backed away from the new predator, his altered hearing mercifully unable to hear Ravens' shriek of agony as the portal she was connected to was forced wider and the ultimate evil emerged. Horns scraping through and dragging hellfire into the world of men Trigon the Terrible stood to his full height, surveyed his new domain and began to turn around to the portal that had birthed him.

XXX

Disconnected from her body, alive only because of the devilish heritage that had delivered this monster to the world Raven hung atop the gateway into the hellscape and faced her father. Time seemed to slow down as she saw him spin, his hand held flat and fingers extended; as she realised he meant to fully seal the way behind him Raven felt no fear, no anger, nothing but a serene sense of contentment, as though she was finally going to rest after a long day. Trigon had used her to enter Earth, albeit earlier than prophesised, and with her purpose served she was nothing, a morsel to be cut down at his will. Even as his nails began to sweep towards her like the scythe of the reaper Raven felt little, in a way she almost welcomed it, an end to her struggles for control, a modicum of peace after a life of isolation; _and maybe I can see mother again._ The sudden thought cheered her, made her feel just that little bit more alive, enough to roll her dreamy eyes towards those of her father and look him in the face as she died.

She wasn't sure what she expected to see in the eyes that had forever poisoned her rage and haunted her dreams, but it certainly wasn't fear. Even more than that, however, she suddenly found herself empathically buffeted by the emotion as she watched his four eyes widen and tilt out of position, her death denied as his killing hand instinctively shot downwards and past his daughter to break his fall. With the pain of her father's emergence receding back to 'normal' levels for opening this kind of monstrous wormhole she glanced down, the cause of Trigons' stumble immediately apparent from the large green rhinoceros snorting in triumph nearby. _Beast Boy?_ ; the realisation pulled her together slightly, enough that she was able to recognise the fast-approaching orange figure from her elevated position, green flashes of light pummelling the prostrate demon lord; _no, Star, you and the others have to get out of here!_

She made to call out to her team mates, her friends, give them a little more time before Trigon recovered from Beast Boys' attack but it was at that instant something else stepped through the portal, the last thing to have done so for a few seconds, and Raven felt her empathic senses overwhelmed to a degree she'd never experienced either on Azarath or Earth. Several texts she'd read with the libraries of her home plane postulated demons felt emotions more keenly than mortals did (a postulation she and those caught in the backlash of her earliest meditation attempts would keenly attest to) and, swamped by the sudden tsunami that all but drowned her, Raven was now convinced those ancient scholars had been right. However even as she curled into a tight ball and tried to breathe against the mental pressure Knowledge, about the only emoticlone left with even a modicum of rational thought, shrieked aloud a question she wasn't sure she wanted an answer to.

What could invoke such bone-chilling terror in the hell-born?

XXX

They'd been expecting the worst but this, this was so far out there even Robin had to pinch himself several times. Ingrained reflexes had him hurl birdarangs at some of the closest unnatural beings to him and he was distantly relieved when the ultra-cold mist they exuded made their burning forms wink into ashes; most of his mind, however, was on the much larger problem before him. He'd arrived on the T-Cycle just in time to see the massive monster, three stories tall if he was an inch, emerge into the world and had fought to keep control of his bladder. Only the sight of Beast Boy hammering into the things' ankle at speed and causing it to crash to the ground had snapped him back to the present and as he saw what the demon had been aiming to kill he disregarded everything except working on putting it in the ground,

"'Fire," he spoke into the communicator tersely, bo staff out as he charged towards the nearest collection of burning freaks, "keep hitting the big one, Cy you as well. B we're on clean-up duty; make sure the little ones don't get away."

"Got it," came Cyborgs' assent, a bright flash of light from the window of the T-Car the augmented teen had driven directly onto the park in search of his missing sister marking his entry into the battle, "want me to speed-dial an exorcist?"

Chuckling grimly Robin made it to the first of the floating figures he'd ear-marked towards the edge of the park and twirled his staff experimentally, finally seeing these things up close. They appeared humanoid, albeit wreathed in fire and with less expression, but Robin was swift and agile enough to take down the handful before him with minimal injuries beyond the odd flash-burn. _It seems they're not used to Earth, or maybe it's atmosphere_ ; he mentally recited his observations, thinking about how to communicate them to the team; _just a shame it's not raining tonight…_

That thought was held as their behaviour suddenly changed; as though realising something simultaneously the vague heads of the creatures suddenly snapped towards the portal, whatever counted as their faces suddenly contorted into expressions of, if Robin was reading them right, dread. _Are they scared of the other one?_ ; the Titan leader risked a glance towards where the tallest demon, now almost recovered to his feet despite being pummelled by Cyborgs' sonic cannon and Starfires' bolts, had suddenly frozen, seemingly staring downwards for an instant, before a voice like thunder rolled over the park like a thunderclap,

" _ **No**_ ", it bellowed, backing away even as red energy began to gather around its head and horns, " _ **I am Trigon, born to rule this world forever – you will not have me!**_ " Between Trigons' voice and a strange, piercing whine Robin couldn't see exactly who he was addressing until the devil stumbled backwards, then in the gap between the demons' legs he saw what was whining and hurled himself to the floor.

XXX

 _This one's for you Cy_ ; as he snorted out the slight pain in his nose Beast Boy morphed back to his regular form in time to see his save pay off; _booyah!_

He had realised what the big red thing was planning and reacted without thinking as he had a few short moments ago. He shifted as he ran, calling one of the most recognisable animals of his home nation to mind and rewarded with a satisfying crack as he hurtled into the devils' ankle with enough force to smash Cinderblock in half, his rhino form sending the evil thing sprawling. Turning around after bulldozing a few minor devils the youngest Titan was about to lend Starfire a hand when with a rush of joy he recognised the sudden eruption of shining light impacting on their enemy's side as he heaved himself upright,

"Alright tin-can," Beast Boy leapt into the air with his communicator in hand, interrupting his celebratory punch only to shift into a kangaroo and kick a nearby burning-ghost to cinders, "first dibs on the GameStation tonight is yours! I'm going Rex, we can… wait, what the…?"

Articulation was not Beast Boys' best skill, therefore his thought process regarding the new arrival that tore its way into his world went in roughly the following order:

 _He's different, he's not on fire._

 _Hey, cool suit._

 _Holy hair-gel Robin, that's a freaking big gun!_

Before Beast Boy could share these thoughts with the rest of the Titans, however, the newcomer had levelled said gun squarely at the face of the bellowing fiend and squeezed the trigger.

XXX

"Who in the blue blazing hell is that?!"

"Friend Cyborg, you should not swear over the communication network."

"I'm seeing Satan hosed down with a minigun Star, I'm allowed to swear for that."

"The gun is not that small friend Cyborg."

"That's what… forget it, focus on the little ones."

"They seem to be after our new friend; that is the unfairest of fights, we should help."

"No, the big guy's trying to run; he's using them as cover," Robin cut in, seeing the supposed Trigon stand and point towards where the stranger stood framed in the muzzle flash of his chattering machine gun, thinning the crowd rushing towards him at their masters' command, "we've got to keep him contained and…"

"Dude are you seeing this?!"

"…Not now Gar, we need to…"

"He just ripped a guys' arm off and hit him with it! Then he tore another one in half!"

" _Not now!_ " With the deft flick of a button Robin eliminated the excited changeling from speaking into the conversation and stared up at their towering adversary, moving out the way of his most likely charge as Trigon stumbled away from the melee, "We need to keep the leader here, whoever this new guy is they're trying to kill him."

"Good luck to them; wow, that one's gonna need three separate graves…"

"Focus Cyborg!"

"Sorry."

"Right, we need to pin red-and-raging; Gar," Robin let the anamorph back into the network, "think you can knock him down again?"

"Get me a clear charge and he's down, baby."

"Cy, Star, you heard him, slow him down however you can while I take out any stragglers, I don't want these things loose in the city."

"Right, what about us?"

"You can… who the hell are you?"

"Look right crud-for-brains." Robin did, then dived to the side as with a squeal of brakes and shower of churned-up earth a beaten up junker van rocketed onto the park a few feet from where he'd been stood, screeching to a halt next to the astonished superhero as the occupants bailed out and stared up at their adversary in amazement,

"Great, we're fighting the Devil," Billy Numerous stated with a huff, "if this gets us killed I'm gonna haunt you Jinx."

"Cram it," she shot back shortly, a wave of her hand causing the park fountains to release high-pressure jets of water everywhere, extinguishing a few nearby fire elementals as she looked directly at Robin, "this doesn't mean anything, we're still enemies."

"Right," he agreed dumbly before shaking his head and factoring the newly-arrived Five into his strategy, "plan is put Trigon-stroke-Satan on the floor and… whoa!"

Whatever Robin had meant to say was lost behind the roar of an explosion and a bellow of pain, Trigon stumbling as something slapped him hard between the shoulder-blades; glancing over, both Robin and the Five goggled as their new friend, now surrounded by the ashes of the demonic host, shouldered what was unmistakeably a rocket launcher and took aim again,

"Is he nuts?" Gizmo demanded, face bleached of colour as the fire gouted from the barrel, "if he misses…"

"See-More that's on you," Robin said quickly, regarding his temporary allies as proof of the strangers' instability became apparent despite the second impact on their towering adversary, "if he misses you have to trap or shoot down the missiles, just one of them hitting an apartment block could be mass casualties." The monocular villain swallowed, then nodded,

"But… alright; Billy keep the monkeys off my back, especially any green ones."

"Way ahead of you See; Giz show that idiot what firepower really is."

"Thought you'd never ask," the diminutive genius grinned deviously, a remote control already in his hands, "what about you traffic-cone, gonna stand there looking ugly or gonna get some work done?" Robins' masked eyes narrowed but despite that he nodded, birdarangs already between his fingers,

"You know it; stay on your toes and stay alive."

The H.I.V.E. nodded and were as good as their word; supported by Cyborg and Mammoth Billy was literally everywhere, hemming the monster in with brute force and disposable fighters despite Trigon's ravening energy blasts and bolts of sorcery slicing swathes from his numbers. Starfire, Jinx, Gizmo and See-More harassed his multiple eyes with curses, rockets and energy blasts while Robin kept one eye on both their opponent and their ally-of-convenience, the solitary figure dividing his attention between Trigon and the other entities coming though the portal. Loathe as he was to admit it the Titan leader realised that they were only doing as well as they were because of the armoured man; despite his apparent disregard for collateral damage Trigon seemed to both hate and fear the stranger enough to direct most of his offence his way. The other warrior, however, seemed all but impervious to anything the demon could throw at him and retaliated with a dizzying array of weaponry, each one blowing minions to dust or leaving marks on Trigon's iron hide. _He's weakening but just one hit could kill any of us except maybe Cyborg or Star_ ; Robin had seen the Tamaranean princess blasted by a small demonic explosive and his heart had jammed into his throat; he only breathed again when her flight stabilised as Cyborg and Jinx covered her retreat; _but Trigon won't run, the other guy will use his heavier ordnance if he does. I don't want to think how much damage they'd do in the streets but the prince of darkness over there has his best chance to win where his buddies can help him_ ; a sudden echoing boom made the Boy Wonder wince; _not that they're doing much beyond dying at the minute_ ;

"Cy how close are you to the portal?"

"Close enough to see it, far enough away from the other guy."

"Who is he?"

"Don't think he's wearing a name badge," the older teen joked grimly, "his picture's not matching anything in my databases."

"Go closest match," Robin commanded, fending off a nearby wraith with an expert staff thrust, "Cy, you still there?" For a heart-lurching second there was silence but Just as Robin began fearing the worst the familiar voice broke through, its tone and the news it brought grim,

"Closest match is Genocide."

The name echoed around the young heroes' brain as he spat a word he'd never use within earshot of Alfred. His worst-case scenario seemed to be rising like a nightmarish spectre; he knew the Titans were good but, even with the dubious backing of the Five, how could they hope to take on someone who'd nearly killed Wonder Woman and bested the Justice League?

"How," he barely recognised his voice, wetting his lips before trying again, "how close a match?"

"Low forties and dropping," that at least was a crumb of good news but even so Robin knew now more than ever he had to consider and prepare for the absolute worst,

"Make a new entry and get everything you can onto it; tell the others do not engage. For now we assume it's the real deal and let him take these things down."

"Right," Cyborg had already opened channels to the other communicators, "I'll spread the word but I don't like this Rob." Despite his private agreement Robin had to soothe such worries for the moment,

"Enemy of my enemy, it has to be."

"Yeah," the metallic teen agreed, the blast of his sonic cannon tinny over the radio, "but where does that leave us when that enemy's gone?"

To that, the Boy Wonder had no answer.

XXX

Prowling around the battles' outskirts Beast Boy had bumped into Mammoth, the bigger metahuman swinging an uprooted lamppost like a baseball bat as he cleared out the last remnants of the fire sprites nearby. The two had shared a tense face-off for a second before the elder grunted, taking a breath as he brushed off some of his burns,

"That's the lot," casually spinning his improvised weapon he set his narrow gaze on their shared bigger problem, "what about him?"

"We take him down," Beast Boy replied with a snarl, opening the channel he needed, "Robin I can do it."

"Not yet B, keep tracking down the smaller ones and an eye on Raven," he commanded, the changeling flicked a glance her way and felt a surge of both hope and impatience at his leaders' commands, "the portal's shrinking."

"Then let me at him!" Beast Boy exploded, "I'm here with Mammoth, we can take him down if we…"

"Are you sure?" The youngest Titan blinked, not sure he'd heard right,

"What?"

"Are you sure you can bring him down?" There was no hesitation, wouldn't have been any even if the eavesdropping Mammoth hadn't been nodding,

"Absolutely," the reply was so cold Robin blinked, then shook his head; _wow, this really is getting to him. But he's right_ ; he licked suddenly dry lips, realising the time for a decisive strike had to be now; _the sooner he's out the sooner we can shut the portal down, get Raven back and think about handling the supposed-Genocide_ ;

"Wait for the word," he replied shortly, quickly signalling to the rest of the Titans on his communicator and asking the nearest Billy to pass the message to his team,

"'Bout time," the clone snorted, cracking his neck as some of his brothers scattered to avoid a descending hoof, "we'll get out the way when Mammoth and snotty go in."

"Glad to hear it," Robin muttered, finger on the trigger as he blocked out the booming voice of their larger adversary,

" _ **It is written**_ ," the demon bellowed, lightning crackling about his horns before striking towards Starfire; wise to the trick after being singed, however, the alien princess barrel-rolled out the way and launched another blast at his already-swollen eyes, " _ **I claim what is mine, nothing can gainsay it. I am Trigon, demon lord of multiple dimensions and not even you can oppose me revenant!**_ " The huge creature reared back with both hands full of crimson power but as he did there was a flash of steel as Mammoth stampeded forwards, his swung lamppost hammering deep into unnatural flesh before he span out of the way – even as Trigon sucked in the breath to yell (hard as that might have been given the blasts of lightning slamming into his chin) Robin seized the chance,

"B, now! Everyone," he led by example, every trick and tool in his belt flying, "give it everything you've got!"

XXX

Beast Boy was in motion as soon as he saw his enemy stumble, Robins' approval coming as he blazed Mammoths' trail and numberless Numerous' dived out of his way. The changeling was beyond fear, beyond fatigue and beyond fury; who or whatever Trigon was he had threatened his pack and hurt Raven somehow – there was no forgiveness for that. As the demon was pummelled by the combined firepower of the H.I.V.E Five, the Teen Titans and his supposed nemesis he lashed out indiscriminately; he heard someone yell in pain and it just drove him even harder, the beasts in his head and the Beast in his mind snarling as he shifted, taking advantage of the distraction to land a crippling blow.

Though anyone who knew him knew Beast Boy was vegetarian; indeed his best friend ribbed him something rotten about it (often literally, hiding his tofu behind rib platters in the fridge), what no-one knew was the real reason behind such a restrictive diet. Before the Doom Patrol Beast Boy had often starved almost to madness, unable to beg, steal or impress his uncle enough to earn food – during those times he often remembered passing out starving only to awaken oddly sated, covered in redness with a strange taste in his mouth, and his ears were sharp enough to hear rumours of people being reported missing a few days after some of those strange blackouts. He never thought too much about it, locking such memories behind what he considered his normal life and refusing to disturb them by tasting flesh again; however the scent and taste of blood during combat made those old skeletons rattle in their closet when the adrenaline wore off. This time, however, this time was different; as the jaws of one the most lethal land predators to grace the planet fastened onto the calf of the reeling, bleeding lord of darkness all parts of Garfield Logan revelled in the crunch of bone and scream of agony as he reared back, pitching Trigon face-first to the floor as he bellowed in triumph, mind almost unhinged by the primal ferocity of the king of the ancient world.

Even against an apex predator Beast Boy would give his all for his pack, including his sanity if needed.

XXX

 _We're winning_ ; with the sudden thrill of victory Robin at last allowed himself to hope that the nightmare was nearly over; _he's going down, Beast Boy did it. Now we have…_ ;

"Wait," he shouted at the sudden blur of much darker green, his strategy upset by the suicidal dash of their erstwhile ally towards the plummeting king of hell, "get out the way!" Shoving past a few Billy clones trying to evacuate the impact zone Robin felt the warning wither on his lips as Genocide; _though the more I see the more I doubt it's actually that Wonder Woman knock-off_ ; stood to full height, guns still blasting up at the descending mountain of red meat as another voice spoke at Robins' side,

"He's crazy man," See-More croaked, unable to tear his eye away as several nearby Billy's nodded, "gonna get pancaked; even with that suit he's…"

What the strange figure was, however, See-More never said as with a swift sidestep the strange warrior dodged the falling king and ended the battle conclusively. As Trigon slammed his abused palms onto the earth the strangers' hands were suddenly full again and Robin realised what would happen a split-second before it did, just enough time to look away as four feet of screaming, shredding steel tore through the demon's wrist then, as he collapsed unbalanced, swung upwards into his descending throat. His final howl choked off into a gargling whine, then a pathetic, rasping mewl, then a menacing silence descended over the ruined park as Trigon the Terrible, scourge of the living and master of multiple hellish dimensions met his end, the dread weapon that had done the deed silent in the blood-soaked hands of its wielder.

It wasn't a perfect silence of course; Robin could aware of other nearby noises, his own hammering heart chief amongst them as someone nearby noisily lost their lunch. The air was alive with the rank perfume of boiling blood, singed bone and sour vomit, a sickening slurp that almost made the Boy Wonder retch disturbing the still as the quiescent blade was ripped from the wet remains of the neck it had half-severed. Even as the Titan leader tried to size up the situation a loud yell of,

"Friend Raven," jerked the masked boys' eyes towards the trail Starfire was making in her haste. Relief hissed from between clenched teeth as he saw the portal fading, the indigo cloak of the sorceress draped over the Tamaranean's arm as she bore her injured friend gently to the ground where Cyborg was already waiting. _It's over_ ; with the adrenaline wearing off Robin felt suddenly weary but refused to show weakness, instead turning to face their former ally and gauge his-stroke-her-its intentions; _not like that tin can they're in is form-fitting_ ; only to realise as soon as he did that the stranger had had the same idea and their eyes met.

His often-brutal training under the Dark Knight had hardened the teenage crime-fighter to all but the most bizarre and hardened criminals; as he looked into and through the soulless visor, however, he discovered that even the patented Bat-glare (and, worse, the Pennyworth expression of mild disapproval) could be eclipsed. This faux-Genocide didn't have a face but in the bottomless void where its eyes should have been Robin lost his courage, then his breath as for an ageless instant the two regarded each other. It made no movement, gave no sign of hostile intent but Robin was under no illusion the only reason he wasn't already greeting his parents was because this terrible being saw no reason to kill him. Apart from the outline there was nothing remotely human about it; it was less a person than a force of nature and, as they had so many times before, Robins' ingrained reactions swung into action,

"Keep perfectly still," he murmured from the corner of his lips, inching his fingertips over to his communicator,

"I'm not moving but my bowels might," See-More whispered back, both he and the remaining Numerous clones freezing in place as finally the inspection was over and the otherworldly superhero, because anyone who could kill like that had to be super, slung his weapon and, as Robin had dreaded, paced towards the now-vanished portal,

"Cy," the Titan leader intoned leadenly, hoping against hope this night wouldn't end in further bloodshed, "you've got incoming."

XXX

Cyborg was underneath the disk of fire even before it finished disappearing, neck craned as he saw the ethereal figure floating towards the ground bush-whacked by a colourful comet. Overwhelming Starfires' gabbled questions with a burst of high-pitched white noise, something a normal human would have barely heard but her Tamaranean physiology registered like an untuned bass band; _which probably explains why their folk songs are so lousy_ ; Cyborg pointed firmly at the floor and to his relief the princess obeyed,

"Friend-Cyborg, friend-Raven is…" for once words seemed to fail the alien girl, the look on her face hopeless as she held one of her family bridal-style, the petite cambion seeming pathetically small in her arms as the mechanically-inclined teen scanned her,

"Give her air Star, just lean back a second," the Tamaranean did, trying desperately to hold in tears as she watched the thin bar-scanner pass over her friend, "heart rate's good and her vitals are okay but I've got no idea what'd going on in her mind. Whatever that bastard did must have hurt her bad."

"But he is now the deceased," Star spat, a flare of temper from the red-head as she shot the corpse a withering look, "and for it the world is much the better place." Despite the circumstances Cyborg felt himself grin a little before turning his attention back to his hurting little sister, his tone as soft as he could make it,

"Raven," once more he silently cursed the human warmth his mechanical hands lacked as he laid a pair of fingers on her closest palm, "Rae can you hear me?" He was beyond grateful when she nodded, her large lilac eyes slowly swimming towards focus as she squeezed his hand softly – he honestly thought he might choke and quickly busied himself making her comfortable. Almost as he began such a task, however, his communicator beeped and at its message he was instantly alert, every remaining weapon in his formidable reserves locking onto the dark image that had just stepped into view by the head of the demon he had helped kill.

With his organic eye closed every scan he could take was snapped and added to the file he had opened for this stranger, though very little of it made good reading. No probe he had could penetrate to the meat of this potential opponent; for all he knew the armour was a sentient A.I., a Slade-bot on super-steroids; and said armour was composed of an unknown alloy, or even a group of alloys, increasing in strength as the recordings went on. Worst of all it wasn't just a physical shield; a shroud of dark energy he could detect but not accurately measure was protecting whoever had donned that plate. Save a pistol-type weapon on his hip Genocide was unarmed, then he suddenly wasn't, either drawing a weapon so quickly Cyborg hadn't detected it or, more likely, pulling it from some micro-holding cell or extra-dimensional space. From the spiking temperature he realised it was the lightning cannon he'd used before and, as his free hand snapped the tip of a protruding tooth from Trigons' now-slack lips, Cyborg quickly added superior strength to this unknown figures' resume. _This will not be easy_ ; unsure what was going to happen next Cyborg weighed his options and found them very much wanting; his metallic components may have weathered some of the other warriors' arsenal but his flesh, and his friends, would not be so lucky. Scanners still engaged, the eldest of the Titans stood to his full height and glanced over only when he heard Starfire whisper,

"Friend-Raven don't…"

"Have to," the empath mumbled back, feebly kicking her way out of Starfires' arms, "it's me, he must have come for me."

"He can come," Cyborg snorted gutturally, powering up his systems as he looked at their likely-next opponent, "but if he tries anything we're gonna send him pack…"

The word tailed off, Raven left to totter forwards as in the glare of reflected lightning Cyborg finally saw his foe organically and realised with sick revulsion what his mechanical senses had missed. Genocide was, or at least had been coated in gore but even as he watched horror-struck his scientific mind broke down exactly how his instruments had detected the armours' protective factor increasing. Sparks from the charge held by his firearm cast obscene shadows over the war-plate as flecks of demonic blood disappeared into the emerald material, its bearer uncaring as it paced towards them with its cyclopean visor not moving from the exhausted half-demon before it, contemplating a solemn judgement. Cyborg wanted to pull her back, touch her shoulder, do anything to protect the girl he'd come to see as dearer than his own flesh but his eye had looked into the abyss that was Genocides' helm and in that absolute darkness it was all he could do to keep himself upright. He could feel Starfire touch the ground by his side, the fact her feet were on the floor indicating she was either exhausted or, more likely, even her limitless emotions had been swallowed by the dread singularity, both Titans left helpless as their darkest but still most beloved sibling took tiny, shaking steps towards her personal apocalypse.

XXX 

Whatever he was he had set her free.

She had known from the instant he breached the hellgate that he was unlike the others, his entry into the world a spike of icy coldness to take the breath away as opposed to the continual burning Trigon and his cavalcade had inflicted during their birth. Awoken by the sudden wash of terror by her father Raven had been semi-lucid throughout the fight, aware enough at least to realise if not react the instant her foul bloodline was severed forever, Trigon's rage, terror and absolute power-lust winking to nothingness and leaving her bereft of a part of herself she had forever hated.

She should have been celebrating; for the first time in her life she was free of her fathers' dread shadow; but instead she felt weak, weaker still in the aftermath of the magic that had been forced through her fragile, half-mortal frame. She wanted to sleep for a thousand years but that craving was delayed in favour of the one thing she needed more, something not even the noblest intentions of her friends had been able to accomplish and what this patricidal killer, still sodden with her fathers' cursed blood, had provided. He might very well kill her; very few who had suffered at his hand would hesitate to lay the sins of her father at her door; but that was merely swapping one death for another and either way she would have the closure she desired so desperately.

As though in a dream and dimly aware part of her was screaming they should run far, far away; _sounds a lot like Rage – what put her cape in a knot?_ ; Raven stepped towards the blurry outline before her, a smear of dull green in her vision until she blinked suddenly. Part of the shifting picture was moving too rapidly for her to focus on, and it was much lighter in colour than the rest; even as her delirious mind struggled to fit the pieces together the tiny bird morphed. Warm hands descended on her shoulders, khaki-green eyes peered at her in concern and she swore part of her tousled hair shifted slightly as the shorter figure took in a deep sniff; even as she opened her mouth Raven realised with dread it was too late, her team mate had already turned, facing down the jade death incarnate before them,

"Leave her alone."

XXX

Beast Boys' words, quiet and solemn, broke the spell, restoring reality for the eight other teenagers struck numb by Trigons' death and the gaze of his slayer. Each took an instinctive step closer before rational thought seized control; as though one mind in three bodies Robin, Cyborg and Jinx threw their arms out to stop anyone approaching further as the two younger teens were too close for anyone to safely interfere. One hand on Starfires' shoulder just in case Cyborg silently raised his other hand and made a circling motion, the other metahumans mercifully catching his drift and carefully strafing around the frozen tableau, giving the trio within it a wide berth as they reunited, animosity temporarily suspended as they waited for the next act in this macabre play to begin,

"Kid's got balls," Mammoth grunted, not able to look for too long at Genosides' false face and idly wondering how the green squirt was holding that unearthly stare,

"Little buddy's always had them," Cyborg agreed, flicking his gaze sideways for an instant, "the second anything happens we go in."

"After you," Billy muttered, no bite to the insult as he just wanted to get out of this place and never be within a fifty-mile radius of the bigger green guy again, "what's he want with her?"

"Did she summon him, or the demon?" See-More suddenly offered before shrinking under the glares of the remaining Titans and, to his surprise, Jinx as well, "Just sayin'; I don't know how her magics work and she was part of that fire-circle-thingy."

"Friend-Ravens' powers may be from the dark but she would never bring such evil to the city of Jump," Starfire assured him, angrily dashing tears from her glowing eyes, "she has lain down the smack on many villains to defend it, including you." See-More growled at this, fingers twitching towards his visor reflexively before Jinx snapped a quick,

"Quiet," as the deadlock before them finally broke.

XXX

 _Flee…_

The hysterical instinct of prey in the face of a carnivore.

 _Back down…_

The cold-blooded practicality of predators catching the scent of larger killers.

 _Bare your throat…_

The submission of an apex predator in the shadow of a larger, more ruthless version of itself.

Garfield Mark Logan had all these and more screamed through his psyche, his animalistic soul echoing the behaviour of each species of the animal kingdom; he heard, he listened and he told every single one of them to take a ticket and get in the God-damned queue because he was not taking a backwards step when one of his pack was vulnerable behind him. He blinked rapidly and often but did not break contact with that sepulchral visor, subtly shifting his weight to keep Raven out of the strangers' direct sight; the brief glimpse and scent he'd caught told him she was exhausted, not that she'd ever admit it, so it was up to him to keep this threat at bay no matter the cost. Trembling head to foot, taking only the shallowest breaths to avoid the aroma of death that clung to the one he was challenging the youngest member of the Titans called on reserves of strength he'd not known he possessed, his resolve so binding he almost heard a snap when the stare-down suddenly ended, his opponent glancing down. Sagging for the briefest instant Beast Boys' eyebrows suddenly rose as his lower position noticed both the sparking gun the armoured man held in one hand and the scorched white twig in the other, it's tip still smoking from its baptism in the blinding energy; _that explains the burning smell at least – holy crap is that enamel?! But what…?_ ; seeing the dread gaze now levelled over his shoulder the young superhero started to shake his head only to pause as the silent man seemed to do likewise, looking away slightly to reveal a small dash of colour on the side of his helm.

Had it been anyone other than Beast Boy the pieces wouldn't have come together; with the Logan family history of Africa, however, the intent became clear when he realised it was a pattern of some kind. He'd seen similar things done, even helped some of his friends numb the pain and highlight the results with clay and paint but what did it mean in this case, and more importantly what might it do to Raven? He made to ask only for his jaw to snap shut from a mixture of sense and survival instinct; there was a mountain of still-bleeding evidence to the fact this superhuman was currently unstoppable; hell, right now Beast Boy wouldn't have bet on Superman having an easy time with him; all he could do was try to minimise the impact of what was about to happen,

"Raven," he whispered as he stepped back and sideways to stand level with his teammate, "Raven look at me," he demanded in an undertone, gently guiding her to face him as the warrior knelt and reached for her closest arm, still-smoking stylus raised in his other hand, "just keep your eyes on me and hold on, it'll be over soon," even as he spoke the sickening scent of singed flesh reached his sensitive nose – more for his juddering stomach than anything else he violated the sorceress's space, folding his arms about her and babbling words as they came to try and take her mind off what, judging by the tightening arm around his back, must have been agony, "you're iron Rae, you can handle this, just hold on a little bit more – it'll all be done soon…"

XXX

Fire and heat barely troubled Raven (one of the very few reasons she had to be grateful for her demonic patronage) so the blistering touch of her father's heated tooth was little more than a scratch, one she would have endured a thousand-thousand times over another second of the sensation hurtling all about her soul-self. It was a thought so strong it had evolved beyond thought, possessed of such singular clarity that immersion in it was akin to diving out of an aeroplane without a parachute – exhilarating for the sense of flight but swiftly tempered by the realisation the inevitable impact was fast approaching. Caught in this slipstream of this inhuman zeal and only growing more terrified as it cycled over and over in her mind Raven cast her senses outwards, frantically looking for a way off the crazy train and the sudden warmth at her front was a boon greater than any mortal treasure. A very faint voice in the back of her mind, possibly Knowledge, Brave or even Timid shrieked a name but she didn't care, diving onto and seeking solace from the offered shoulder and its attached psyche. Shielded from the worst of the unearthly cognizance by familiar emotions, thoughts, desires and memories slowly sense started to return, the dull ringing in her ears registering and with an effort of will she recognised it as speech,

"…done soon, just hang in there – I, I think he's nearly finished," she recognised the voice and the mind she was faintly touched to, the normal rambunctious plethora of feelings instead focussed and sharp; _towards me, for me, because he gives a damn about me_. The sudden realisation rose with a whelm of equal parts gratitude and revulsion; she'd done little but scorn her teams' gentlest concerns and they'd repaid her with selfless courage by standing up to the devourer of worlds, and with the cruellest irony the one most often flayed by her pessimism had gone beyond even that heroic duty. Beast Boy could have left her to her fate, instead he'd faced down Trigon's slayer and was now holding her together, body and soul; in that instant Raven wanted to step back in time and slap herself for every cutting insult, every subtle rebuke and every ill-tempered use of her powers; she had never been more grateful to another or ashamed of herself. A sob bubbled in her throat, her free arm clinching tighter around shoulders smaller but infinitely-stronger than her own and hearing such a noise only drove him to encourage her further,

"Easy, easy, c'mon Rae just a few more seconds, not even that; there, there," the exhilaration in his voice matched that in his mind and a second sob was half-converted into a giggle; connecting to Beast Boy's mind when he was excited was like being in the middle of a champagne explosion, "it's over, it's all over now, you're done."

She knew he was right, the strangers' mental presence departing like the wind of a bullet train as the pressure on her arm lessened, only the burning weal on her forearm left in its wake. She remained where she was for a heartbeat, then several more until her self-loathing for leeching yet more strength from her team mate drove her to move; stumbling back half a step she thought she might fall only for a hand at her shoulder to steady her. She was desperate to say something, anything to convey her gratitude but her tongue felt as numb and heavy as the rest of her, so much so that it was only when she tried to roll her eyes up to follow the shocked path of his own that she belatedly realised her latest loss of this wretched night come to pass.

XXX 

In private moments he had often wondered what it would be like to hug a girl, not one of Starfires' count-the-pops-your-joints-are-making grabs of doom but a real embrace, like those from Elastigirl in his Doom patrol days. Despite his boasts to the contrary, however, he'd realised such fantasies were likely to remain just that; green skin, protruding fangs and excess (green) body hair were not effective turn-ons to the female of the species after all. Of course, his luck being what it was now it was happening he barely registered that of all his friends and fellow Titans it was Raven, mysterious, isolationist and, dare he say it, creepy Raven who had ended up in his arms, trembling from exhaustion and pain so much he couldn't consider what they'd shared a hug. As the branding tool fell to the earth Beast Boy kept half an eye on the one who'd used it as Raven suddenly stepped back, teetering on her heels before he reacted, his palm planting his team mate on her own feet once more.

He meant to say something when his eyes were drawn to sudden movement; for a heart-stopping second he thought the sorceress was bleeding before recognising the red droplet as it tumbled from her forehead. In agonising slow-motion the bloodstone fell, tracked by two pairs of eyes as it landed in the palm of an unbreakable glove, its ruddy crimson light smothered as emerald fingers closed over it with an audible creak. Aware once more of the lethal stranger by their side both Titans stepped backwards as he pushed himself smoothly to his feet, shielded vision fixed on his procured treasure until both it and his free hand tracked forwards, the breath catching in Beast Boys' throat as one of the fists he'd seen rip off limbs and tear screaming wraiths in twain was levelled squarely at his chest.

 _If he pushes me I'm toast, either from the force then or the heart attack afterwards_ ; mind sprinting a mile a minute the changelings' eyes flicked rapidly between gauntlet and helm until a crazy idea sprang up in his mind; _so crazy it might just work!_ If he was wrong he was guaranteed to end up messily dead but he'd survived diving through a door to nothingness and rhino-charging a demon lord so far tonight, weren't good things supposed to come in threes? Gathering up whatever scraps of courage he had left he balled up his hand, glanced at it as though it might be the last thing he ever saw then thrust it out carefully; there was contact, a touch of living flesh against death-wrought adamantine for the briefest of instants before it was over, the gulf between them restored as teen and titan retracted their bumped fists. Even as he exhaled what he'd feared would be his last breath Garfield suddenly felt he could stand a little taller, regarding the more-familiar stranger as he looked over his and Ravens' heads and gave a single nod of recognition, up and down. _The others_ ; the reminder almost made Beast Boy turn around and check they were alright until a musical crack shattered the still evening air like a gunshot.

As ethereal fire sprang up around the first that had reduced Ravens' gem to powder the taller stranger abruptly turned and strode away, picking up the pace to a sprint as before nineteen appalled eyes the flame spread, coruscating power flowing over the battle suit as its bearer leapt up between the eternally-closed eyes of his most recent kill. Still the fire blossomed into an aura about him, hungrily consuming the deceased demon at his feet as he pumped the shotgun he'd summoned one-handed, the remnants of the Portals' power unleashed to open a tiny tear into a burning, bloody realm. There were farewells, no heroic epitaphs to mark his passing; in silence he rushed into the hell-maw and let it flare out behind him, his dead quarry left in their reality as he hunted fresh prey in his own once more.

As the embers of the flame held within the mystical gem of Trigons' Portal began to effervesce his corpse to crimson mist the realisation the nightmare was over seemed to hit them all simultaneously – the demon was dead, Jump City was safe and all was well...

…then everyone started talking at once and the peace was shattered completely.

XXX

 _Nice enough chap_ ; Beast Boy wasn't sure exactly what he was thinking, wasn't even exactly sure what was real and what wasn't at the minute but a few very simple things had become fixed in his mind. Firstly Raven was safe which was good, second the scary demon guy and his horde of burning minions were snuffed out which was better, third the hullabaloo all around him was getting really, really annoying and he doubted it was doing the girl stood by his side any good either. _She needs to get back to the Tower, make sure she's okay_ ; Beast Boy wasn't a doctor but he knew it was often the wounds you couldn't see that hurt the worst but there was no chance of his getting any kind of message out in the current maelstrom. The rest of the Titans and the entire H.I.V.E. Five were jabbering worse than a tribe of howler monkeys in mating season, taking to and at each other in equal measures so, quickly shooting a glance sideways to check Raven was still upright, Beast Boy cleared his throat,

"Quiet, quiet; oi, you lot," his voice rose in volume but not tone, staying focussed as it scythed through the unfocussed demands, denunciations and denials; strangely patient, Beast Boy waited until the last of the chatter died down before carrying on, "everything else can get shoved for now, we need to get back to the Tower and… yes?"

A touch on his arm had him look over and fall silent, yielding to the only one who had more authority in this situation as she had, indirectly or otherwise, been the cause of it. Raven seemed drained on every level; it looked like she could barely bring herself to look at her friends, even her normal monotone ghostly and faint as, with an effort of will that taxed all her emotions aside from Sloth, she spoke as though she were a penitent before the gallows,

"I am so sorry."

"What, for summoning Old Nick?" Whatever talents Billy Numerous may have possessed tact and subtlety weren't amongst them, even less so as he went on despite the sorceress's obvious flinch, "Why'd you do-oowww!" Rubbing his now-throbbing ear the replicator glared reproachfully at the glowering Cyborg before someone else thought fast and seized control of the situation before it got too far out of hand,

"Enough," once more Beast Boys' tone was level but grave, his eyes meeting all others present be they masked, cat-like, glowing green or cybernetic, "we are not doing this here; if I'm too cold, too hungry and too tired to have a debrief in the middle of Jump City Raven definitely is – you're not hurt are you?"

"Uhh," put on the spot suddenly the empath couldn't meet his eyes, "no, not really – just, exhausted."

"Exactly," Beast Boy went on, nodding as though he'd just score an unassailable point in a debate, "now I can smell a decent place some way over there," he jerked a thumb over his shoulder, "so what we're going to do now is pile into our rides, bankrupt our emergency funds for an all-you-can-eat pizza binge and go back to the Tower to figure all this out. Before that though," for the first time since the two had met it was Raven who wilted before his attention as Beast Boy faced her directly, expression inscrutable, "I've got one question for you."

 _It had to come_ ; the inevitability didn't mean she had to like it though, mere thoughts of what the shapeshifter might ask making her insides squirm with embarrassment and shame but she couldn't leave him with silence, not after this. Trying in vain to gather up something like a mental façade she was forced to swallow bile even as the first voice spoke in her defence,

"Wait B, you just said…"

"No Robin," Raven's voice was brittle with fatigue but the other teen fell silent at it, even backing up a pace as she glanced at him before settling on her inquisitor with a last flicker of defiance sparking up, "one question; break the habit of a lifetime and make it a good one." Beast Boy didn't rise to her taunt, didn't do anything save silently stare her down, his face as expressionless as marble and the sight of him so sombre grated her already-strained nerves like a rasp. Seconds snailed by, the sands of time falling on her head like boulders as she saw his chest inflate, the tip of his pink tongue flick cross his lower lip, his mouth open as the axe fell,

"Why did the chicken cross the road?"

As Raven's face dropped through the floor it took more self-control than he'd believed he possessed to keep his face straight, regarding her with bored affability while on the inside he rejoiced – looking like he'd slapped her with a wet haddock was better than her seeming so friable in his opinion. It wasn't just her either; he couldn't just feel the disbelief curdling the air, he could practically taste it; _if this was an animated series I'd be hearing face-faults right about now_. Despite his best efforts he cracked a small smile as a sudden thought popped unbidden into his head, though before his stone façade could crumble any further it happened. A strange noise, a sort-of cross between a hiccup and a squeak forced itself into the open, the culmination of almost eighteen months solid work on his part and sweeter than the trumpet of angels calling the Pearly Gates to open; _it was also totally adorable, though I probably shouldn't tell her that_. Best of all it wasn't alone; in quick succession two more such explosions escaped Ravens' suddenly pitching chest, leaking through the hand she clamped over her mouth in last-ditch defiance before the inevitable happened.

XXX

He could have asked anything of a being of almost-limitless magical means; the opportunity to scry the future, have fate shifted in his favour, potentially correct a mistake made in the past that would have led him to a much brighter present for him regardless of the cost to the Titans, and he had immediately forsaken it all in favour of the most puerile joke imaginable. It was beyond stupid, far past moronic and deep into the uncharted territories of idiocy; at any other time she would have lambasted him as the worst type of brain-dead fool ever to gain sentience…

…right now she just couldn't stop laughing.

It was so surreal, so completely out there she just couldn't fathom it; in a devastated park, in the shadow of the burning corpse of her hated father and surrounded by friends and enemies alike after being put through an emotional, magical and physical wringer that line; so corny, so pathetic and so utterly Beast Boy; was the final straw. Eyes filmed with tears of mirth Raven had no choice but to be swept up in buffeting gales of laughter, first hunching over then slumping to her knees as she caught sight of Beast Boys' nonplussed expression. She couldn't contain it, couldn't even begin to worry about how much damage her uncontrolled powers were doing; she could barely think of anything other than how good it felt to finally erupt like this and from what she could hear she wasn't the only one. She dimly recognised Cyborgs' booming laugh meshing with Starfires' helpless giggles; someone else was trying to bawl Beast Boy out only to falter, swear and then collapse with the rest of them. Pausing only to heave down a deep breath she pushed herself to her knees, trying to force her aching jaw to work before…

"Oh come on, it wasn't that funny."

…too late!

XXX

"You, you dork _,_ " Jinx managed sometime later as she rubbed her eyes, "oh there are tears, there are actual tears!" Blinking her blurry vision she saw See-More wiping his visor and Mammoth still on his knees; she was about to chew the changeling out some more when her ears picked up another noise over the sound of hilarity dying down and flushed the remainder of the mirth away,

"Oh hell," she spat, trying to work out where the sirens were coming from, "cops!"

"C, crawl for it!" Gizmo croaked, the two remaining arms of his backpack thrashing feebly as he hadn't yet recovered from his laughing fit, a malady Jinx swiftly remedied via application of boot to rear end,

"Move it, all of you; we've got a van full of stolen goods and the goody-goods on hand, I'm not spending a night in the cells…"

"You're right," another voice cut in, making the hexmistress jump; _Batman I could understand but how does someone that brightly-coloured get that stealthy?_ ; "no-one is spending a night in any cells."

"But…"

"But nothing," Robin overrode her, looking over each of the recovering Five individually before, to their surprise, smiling slightly, "you backing us up back there is a big part of why we're all here now – one good turn deserves another. Besides," he shrugged as they all swapped glances, "I don't know about you but I'd kill for a pizza right about now."

There was silence for a few seconds as the H.I.V.E. formed a loose huddle, some of them still snickering slightly as Robin heard his team also finish picking themselves up. His mentor may not have approved directly but the Boy Wonder knew of several times when even Batman had put aside old rivalries to solve a more immediate problem and his mind this was certainly one of those times. He was pulled from his introspection by a coughing chuckle from See-More, the cyclops regarding his face with a question mark illuminated on his visor,

"Wow, guess there really is a man under that mask after all." Robin smirked,

"What, you thought I was a machine?"

"I owe Ravager twenty bucks if you're not," Jinx broke in, expression somewhere between suspicion and hope, "but what do we tell the boys in blue to bail out of this one?"

"Thought you'd never ask," not quite as badly afflicted by his team mates joke as the others Robin waved them all over before quickly checking, "Raven, are you alright; you can sit this out if you have to? And how's your arm?" He tried to catch a glimpse as the sorceress, face flushed with laughter and with a shuddering Starfire in close attendance, stumbled forwards, the Boy Wonders' vision blocked by her sleeve,

"I'm fine Robin, I'll be fine for a while," and she would; despite the slight cramp from laughing so hard such an explosive release of mirth had galvanised her spirit, banishing both the spiritual ache and mnemonic pain of her fathers' possession of her flesh. Nodding and trusting her word the Titan leader beckoned everyone closer and divulged the cover story he'd put together,

"Here's what happened…"

XXX

Eyes flicking from the outline of charred grass to the squat figure glaring up at him, the interviewing officer stilled his trembling grip on his pencil and tried again,

"So, you're saying this whole thing was a set-up?"

"For the third time yes," Gizmo grated, just about refraining from swearing, "and I'm beginning to think it was meant for both of us."

"Both of… who?" _And this is why I don't pay taxes_ ; the thought raced across the small super-genius's mind as his teeth crunched together; _it pays for idiots like these!_ ;

"Us and the Titans you…" he sucked in a breath, then let it out, "like I said, someone posted a picture of what Jinx believed was a runic circle through our door with a note saying they would neutralise the dark one of our mutual enemy. She translated some of the runes as meaning binding and entrapment," the officers' eyes flicked to the named mage who nodded, letting Gizmo carry on his story, "and no prizes for guessing who the dark one was. So we pulled the robbery; nothing too serious, no civilians involved because Jinx couldn't tell exactly what the spell was supposed to do; and threw it when we had the chance. It hit, then things really went to hell…"

"…Because it wasn't an entrapment spell," another voice, more exhausted but still carrying, broke in, "it was to do with summoning, though the two can look very similar if just a few of the runes were reversed, which I assume happened here?" Jinx help her hands up in surrender,

"You're the expert, runes aren't my thing but it looked like some of the circles I'd seen. I'm pretty sure I know who sent it though; Brother Blood," the police official scribbled into his notebook, "know his writing anywhere, he graded enough of my reports. He must have wanted Raven out the way and used us to do his dirty work." She scuffed the ground, glancing across at where her other team mates were telling their part in the story and Robin was methodically filling out paperwork with practiced efficiency as their interviewer looked up again,

"I see; and when the, ah, spell worked?"

"Yes but I was able to teleport here along with Beast Boy before it took full effect," Raven continued, not quite able to meet the mans' eye though this was luckily masked by her tiredness, "the circle fed off my magic, though I was able to limit the summoning to a few… lesser entities that my team dispatched with the help of the Five."

"Right," the officers' tone was unsettled as he cast another glance at the scorched earth, "so, if the robbery was downtown, why are…?"

"Oh for the love of Pete," Gizmo snapped, temper giving way as his damaged backpack shot him to eye-level with the donut-muncher, "we're crooks alright; we steal, we cheat and we swindle but we're not heartless, leave that to Slade. I, we all saw what that piece of paper did to doom-and-gloom and we couldn't let it slide, so we followed them out here and helped put a stop to it. We're not heroes, we just didn't need vengeful Titans on our asses and anyway, those things were on fire – hard to steal anything when the city's burnt down."

"Indeed," the law enforcement operative finished before snapping his notebook closed, regarding the metahumans with a piercing eye, "normally we'd book you for burglary at the least but, given Robins' testimony that this would have been a lot worse but for you, we're remanding you to their custody," he suddenly loomed into Gizmo's face and despite himself the younger man recoiled slightly, "if it were up to me I'd be throwing the book at you but the Titans have a lot of sway higher up. One toe out of line and you'll never see daylight again."

"Yeah, yeah; any more machoism or are we free to go?" Giving her a gimlet eye for another few seconds he nodded and strode away, Jinx letting out a quiet breath as he did,

"That was close," Gizmo muttered, glancing up at her as she nodded,

"Yeah, now let's get out of here quick before anything else happens."

Fortunately there wasn't too much else to discuss, the hairiest moment coming when they had to coax Mammoth into giving up his van keys as the vehicle was to be impounded for carrying stolen goods. None of the Five were happy about this but Mammoth, as the driver, was closest to the battered old hulk, dropping the key into an outstretched forensic officers' hand,

"Scratch it you brought it," he grizzled menacingly before sloping off to join the other nine, eyeing up the T-Car with trepidation, "how're we doing this?"

"You, me, B, Rae and Billy in my baby," Cyborg spoke, only the slightest hitch in his voice betraying his dismay at seeing his precious wheels having her footwells despoiled by strangers' feet, "Gizmo's got enough power in his backpack to make it though 'Fire will be carrying Jinx close by just in case," Mammoth nodded at this, seeing his diminutive friend fiddling with the smoking appliance and not wanting him to end his days as a smear on the pavement, "while Rob and See-More go on ahead on his bike. They'll open up for us, we're getting the order in."

"Plenty of sides? Meat toppings?" Despite himself Cyborg couldn't help grinning as he nodded,

"Plenty and only the meatiest!" Ignoring Beast Boys' disgruntled 'savages' from the cheap seats Mammoth echoed the tall Titan's grin and slapped him softly on the shoulder as he headed towards the car,

"Sounds good, now start up and put your foot down; I'm starving!"

XXX

Amazingly, as all concerned would agree years down the line, everything went without a hitch, the timings for arrivals and preparations for such a feast running so smoothly that the only hitch came when Robin noticed one of the Five set a stack of pizza boxes on the kitchen side then stagger slightly, catching himself on the counter top. Alarmed, Robin eased past the scrum now developing as everyone fought for slices and came up on his side,

"You all right Billy – there's just you at the minute right?"

"Yeah, just me," the cloner nodded, his smile strangely distant as he sat down heavily, head in his hands as the others started to fall silent, noticing his odd behaviour, "it's just, I just didn't really think about it until now; did that really happen?" He looked up and all of them, even Robin, were struck by the honest confusion and disbelief in his eyes as he chuckled distractedly,

"Did we, or we and the other guy, did we really just knock off Old Scratch hisself?"

The question seemed to spread like an earthquake from its epicentre, rolling over each of the celebrating heroes as, removed from the numbing balms of terror, fury, concern and victorious elation, the outright impossibility of what they had done, who they had _seen die_ in front of them hit like a brick to the face. The only one unaffected was Starfire, who was unaware of the Devils' significance but soon deduced he must have been an important figure from the way her friends and new-friends suddenly swayed and, in a few cases, collapsed into the nearest seats looking dazed. Worry started to gnaw at the edges of the Tamaraneans' conscience as the previously celebratory air was bulldozed flat but before she could think of anything lighten the mood (or locate the ingredients for her peoples' broth of victory) someone else spoke up to answer Billys' earth-shattering question,

"No," though her voice was soft and she was regarding her boots as though they were the most interesting thing in the world every head turned towards the speaker, Raven forcing herself to carry on as she resisted the urge to hide under her cloak until they all went away, "that, that wasn't your Satan. His name was Trigon," her breath hitched and she gritted her teeth, forcing her face up to look them all in the eyes despite her swimming vision; _after everything they've done to save their world and Azarath they deserve the truth_ ;

"He was my father."

Sometimes her empathy was more curse than gift and, surrounded by a sudden soup of confusion, alarm, disbelief and trepidation, this was one of those times. Muttering a calming mantra under her breath the Azarathian glanced from one face to another, part of her fractured psyche noting idly that, though a lot of the assembled were looking between each other, none at least outright had shied away from her; _yet at least_. The little voice in her ear sounded a lot like Timid but before she could think about it too much there was a quick clap as Robin restored order, looking at Raven directly with an expression of mingled apprehension and resolve,

"You've, got a few things to explain Raven?" Despite herself she smiled wanly,

"That's putting it mildly."

"You sure…?" She nodded, glancing at the closest members of the rival team,

"They were there, they helped; they deserve to know." The squire of the Dark Knight nodded and addressed the others solemnly,

"Everyone get a drink, whatever you want to eat on a plate and sit down; Starfire you know how Raven takes her tea?" The alien nodded excitedly,

"Oh yes, I shall make the beverage of hot water and dried leaves…"

"You won't," Mammoth's voice suddenly rumbled over her own, the taller metahuman fishing in his coat pocket for a second before placing a tall green bottle on the side with a musical clink, "try something stronger."

"Dude where…?"

"There was an off-license 'round the corner from the pizza place; I went for a walk while you were waiting for the order," he commented offhandedly as Billy tried to read the bottles' label, "it's not stolen and I'm old enough before you try that."

"But none of us are, except Cy." Robin pointed out only for his sometime-enemy to snort dismissively, shaking his great head as his brutish features were cracked by a long-suffering smirk,

"I just kneecapped the devil so I'm having a drink; she looks like she needs one." The two regarded each other for a long moment before Robin glanced away first,

"Star, Raven it won't affect you will it?" Both shook their heads and, mollified, the Boy Wonder nodded, "if you're underage no more than one glass; Cy scrub the footage afterwards and make sure the bottle gets incinerated, don't need to give the press any more cheap shots at us." See-More snickered, already rooting through drawers looking for a corkscrew,

"Cheap shots are about the only thing we can afford right now; I'll deal with this, someone plate me up half a seafood special, some fries and some 'slaw…"

Ten minutes later Raven found herself in her favourite chair, everyone else sprawled around the living room as, putting off the moment, she took a sip of the dark red wine See-More had passed around. It was hot and sour, little better than rot-gut but it burned off the very edge of her fear; maybe there was something to the tales of Dutch courage after all? Licking her lips she drew in a breath, held it a second then expelled it while silently cursing her shaking nerves; she knew what she had to do, why was it so hard to actually do it?

"Take your time little sis," she glanced up at Cyborgs' words, the half-machine regarding her benevolently from where he was leant against the back of the settee, "it's barely been an hour since we left."

"Really?" Starfire's hair lashed Robin's chest and neck as she whipped around to look at the glowing clock in the cooker, "It feels like the life-span of a morphlark has passed."

"What's a…?"

"Don't ask," Beast Boy quickly shut down Gizmo's query, shuddering as he recalled asking Starfire about some of the animals indigenous to her home planet; that was a biology lesson he never wanted repeating thank you very much, "anyway, as tin-can was saying Rae take your time." She just about managed to glower softly, grateful for a crumb of normality after a night shot to madness by her fathers' dread grasp,

"Raven," there was no heat behind the correction, more weary acceptance as she steeled herself, trying to coax Brave to take the helm at the same time as wrestle Timid down until this ghastly story was told, "but, no need to put this off, you deserve to know everything, from the beginning," the wine in her glass rippled as her power thrashed in agitation, she put the fragile goblet down hastily before ploughing on, "it started with my mother…"

It was done with frequent, halting pauses and several of the others having their questions hushed by other members of her captive audience, but regardless it was done; much as it hurt, Raven told them everything.

XXX

 _Would it have been better if he hadn't missed?_ ; even as the thought popped into her mind she dismissed it – even this purgatory was better than the hell her fathers' hands would have delivered her to if not for a friends' intervention. The memory of Trigons' first fall was blurred by pain almost had her glance up into the face of the silent judgement being passed by her friends but she couldn't do it. Since she'd finished the story of her life and the part she was supposedly destined to play in the apocalypse her expectations of their reactions had flipped between horror at the threat she had posed to the world, revulsion that they'd held a viper so close to their breast for so long or, or she didn't know. She reached for her glass again only to flinch, Timid bursting out of whatever closet the rest of the emoticlones had locked her in to scream blue murder in her psyche as a weight threw itself onto the seat beside her; _who's…?_ ;

"I saw your face," she swung around in shock, purple meeting pink as about the last person she'd expected continued to speak, "just before you disappeared, I saw your face." Jinx reached forwards, drawing the now-revealed cambion gently but insistently into a hug; Raven stiffened, then collapsed into the compassionate embrace, barely noticing as Jinx knocked her hood back with her cheek; _and I thought I had a hard-luck story? No-one at the Academy could top this, could even come close_ ;

"Whatever you think you are let me tell you this," holding Ravens' shoulders she pushed the other girl back a little, locking their eyes as the rest of the Five swapped perturbed glances; Jinx was usually sensitive about her odd pupils, "no-one who looked that scared in that moment could have been helping whatever was happening to them, and no demon would have told her friends and _definitely_ not her enemies to run while they could."

The villainess said no more, didn't trust her own voice as the other girl trembled, sinking against her again as shudders wracked her small frame. Softly stroking her back with a free hand Jinx focussed on her breathing, casting her eyes sideways to see life return to the rest of the assembled in the aftermath of Raven's awful story. Silence pervaded the common room, thoughts made but not translated to voice until someone cleared their throat, both eyes regarding his sister figure and voice laden with respect as he charged his glass and spoke,

"To Raven." _Eh?_ ; caught out by this the empath was just quick enough to see and hear the gesture echoed by all present, the sight and sensation so unexpected she would have burrowed under her cloak but for a suddenly-smirking Jinx pinching her hood back,

"Not a chance," she chuckled before becoming more serious as she stood up and made to move away, giving the other girl some space, "don't hide any more, you don't have to." Suddenly bereft of her support-slash-meat-shield Raven was acutely aware of her ears carbonising as she squirmed in the face of such outright respect, the faintest traces of her protest blown away by a laugh from Gizmo,

"You and these other four caped morons have kept most of this city clean for years; hell I can't count the number of times I've limped away with a boot-print on my ass after we've squared off; and now you tell us this? That the powers I've seen snare my missiles in mid-air are hard for you to control? You never had a childhood because everything you did had to be focussed on harnessing your emotions, which you still have to deal with even now? That you had a death sentence hanging over your head since the day you were born to your sixteenth birthday, and despite that you were still fighting crime and taking names at the same time as looking for a way to head it off?" He shook his head, tipping back another short measure of his drink before snorting in laughter, "What am I supposed to think apart from 'dear God if that couldn't stop her what chance have we got' – we're going to have to really up our game."

"And not just us," See-More chipped in with a smirk, "after the last time you crossed paths Dr Light might still be running now – tell him you beat him at the same time as having all this in your head and he'd set a new land-speed record. Anyway, look on the bright side, you can forget about most of it; Trigon or whatever his name was ain't ever coming back, which reminds me," his voice rose as another burning question forced its way to the front of his mind, "who was that other guy anyway? Was he one of, uh," he pointed vaguely at the ceiling, "you know, them?"

Brows were furrowed for a few minutes, Raven breathing a silent sigh of relief as the attention was directed away from her while at the same time the truth behind See-Mores' words began to sink in; _Trigon's dead, the Prophecy is broken and so is his gem – that means I, I'm free_ ;

"No, none of the League were there," Robin answered, Cyborg nodding in confirmation as his team leader began to speculate, "we don't know who it was, the closest match on Cyborgs' database was Genocide."

"Who?"

"Someone who's tangled with Wonder Woman several times and come off better on a lot of them," Robin said darkly, slightly relieved as Gizmo shrank back at his guarded warning, "she's really bad news, like Slade-level bad if not worse. It was one reason I wanted everyone who was there back here," he admitted, the H.I.V.E. regarding him with sudden suspicion as he did his best to look affably embarrassed, "right now we've got a potentially-new super with phenomenal strength and speed, armed and armoured to the gunnels and apparently zero concern for civilian casualties, and worst of all we've got no idea where he is. The League will have to be informed; I'll do that first thing tomorrow; but before I write that paperwork I need all the information anyone can give me about him. Let's go in order; Beast Boy, you were first on the scene."

"Uh…" Seeing the direction of his eyes Robin quickly shook his head; _oh, right, Rae's never been good at dealing with shocks around other people_ ; "…well, he came out of the portal."

That titbit of information had everyone blink, though it was Cyborg who broke the silence,

"What, he just pushed through like they did?"

"Yeah, and they were not happy to see him; I think you'd just got there, did you hear Trigon shout?"

"So they were definitely afraid," Robin concluded before turning to the Five, who had missed the start of the battle, "seems our green friend…"

"Rob, please, I'm sat right here."

"Sorry, our cool green friend,"; _boy did I walk into that one_ ; at the smattering of chuckles Beast Boy could only glower death at the masked hero, though to his credit Robin kept the amusement off his face as he went on, "was known to Trigon and was somehow in his realm. Wouldn't be the first time a meta has crossed between worlds, though in this case it looked like he crossed back over as well – did anyone get a good look at how he teleported out?"

"Wasn't a teleporter, not a mechanical one," Gizmo stated, backed up by Cyborgs' nod, "takes a lot of juice to displace like that and even with half my electronics on the fritz I'd have recorded it. It was magical, had to be; he only did it when he smashed that gem didn't he?"

"Yeah, got that right, and I got all his combat info already locked," the half-metal man took over, his bionic eye suddenly shining red as he lined up a few memory files, "take a look – this is what you guys missed." With that, he focussed the memories through his optical circuits, eye acting like a projector as the rest of the room watched entranced.

Though mercifully brief at the time, by the end the few minutes of footage had finished there was no-one present who wasn't disappointed there was no encore or popcorn,

"Damn that was hardcore," Jinx gasped as fiery forms fell apart following a one-sided argument with a shotgun, "he ripped them apart!"

"Yes friend-Jinx," Starfire agreed, cocking her head as a jade fist ploughed into and through a magmatic chest, "on Tamaran he would have been feasted most highly and given first pick of mates for such a display." The hexmistress sniggered, trying to crush the very faint warmth in her belly as she realised the alien girl had called her friend,

"On that evidence I wouldn't say no; I wouldn't dare!"

"Glad he was on our side," Beast Boy cut in with feeling, knowing he'd have lasted about as long as one of the lesser demons had those weapons been trained on him before suddenly leaping to his feet, furious with himself as he belatedly remembered the most important reason for them all to be back at the Tower; _and I was there when it happened – how could I forget?_ ; "Raven, your arm!"

XXX

Robin could have kicked himself – the first and most important part of the post-battle clean up, make sure everyone's okay, and he'd completely skipped it. Luckily it seemed he'd gotten away with it as, far from masking any pain, Raven seemed to be reminded of it by the changelings' sudden explosion, pulled back to the present from dreams of a future she never thought she'd see,

"My… oh, yes, it's fine, it doesn't hurt at all – I'm, ah, close to fire-proof." There was a general sigh of relief but Beast Boy wasn't satisfied, pacing up to her chair and kneeling by the side of it in a way she'd have considered an invasion of her personal space on an ordinary day. _But this day turned out far from ordinary_ ; despite herself she smiled slightly as Beast Boy looked at her shrouded arm, not noticing her scrutiny; _and thanks mostly to you I'm here to see it Garfield_ ;

"May I?" His gaze flicked her way and she nodded, leaning forwards as she pulled up her sleeve to reveal the brazen mark on her forearm, just above the back of her wrist,. Everyone bar Beast Boy craned forwards, each of them seeing the distinctive pattern but only one of them able to glean any meaning from it, though before she could speak Beast Boy had already nodded,

"Yeah, it's the same one; he had a mark like this on his helmet," he explained, tapping his brow where it had roughly sat on the rim of the vision plate, "I knew what he was planning, seen it before in Africa – do you know what it means?" Raven shook her head,

"No," she replied, seeing Jinx also reply in the negative from the corner of her eye, "I'll look into it but I don't think it's anything bad – if he wanted me dead I'd not be here now."

"I'd've…"

"No Ga-B," she just about managed to swerve at the last minute, realising Beast Boy likely wouldn't want his real name out amongst those who would, at best, tease him worse than she, Cy or Robin ever did, "you wouldn't have, none of you would. If he thought I was a demon he'd have killed me."

"Why?"

"He kills demons."

"I noticed," Cyborg said in a measured drawl, "but what's that got to do with you?"

"He kills demons," she said again, holding up a hand to forestall further queries as she thought about how best to explain it, "when he, held me, you know putting the mark on," she shook her sleeve down to cover the brand, not used to its appearance yet, "I linked… minds, in a way, with him."

"You can do that?"

"Yes, though it usually takes a lot of concentration and focus," she answered Mammoths' question at the same time as catching Robins' eye almost without meaning to, "though in his case none of that applied. He doesn't have a mind, exactly; I can't really explain it very well – it's like he has one but it's, eroded is about the best word I can find for it."

"Eroded?" Starfire parroted, looking around the room for confirmation of her suspicions, "does that mean worn away?"

"Yes, how I can't say for sure but from what he did to my father and his minions I'd imagine fire, time and blood, a lot of blood, and it's been going on so long he's lost nearly everything," Raven shivered for a moment before recollecting herself, reliving that terrifying mnemonic plunge and trying to put the sensation into words, "there were no emotions, dreams or wants; he's literally a walking personification of 'kill demons', there's nothing else to him, it's what he is. It was frightening, I've never felt anything like it," a sudden inspiration seized her, "you could say he's enlightened in a way; no concerns except kill the nearest demon, once it's dead find the next one and repeat."

A moment of silence fell over them all, each digesting this unpalatable news in their own time until arguably the most natural-born warrior present spoke, her usually-joyful face creased with unease,

"That is…"

"Brown-trousers terrifying?"

"I was going to say sad," Starfire overrode See-More's comment, "the culture of Tamaran focusses on the war but never to that extent. And you are not wearing the trousers of brown See-More, those are the trousers of white." _There must be a humour here I am not understanding_ ; hearing a smattering of chuckles at her comment Starfire cast Robin a glance, the Boy Wonder inclining his head slightly to let her know he'd explain later as See-More spoke again with a shudder as he recalled the sensation of the taller metahumans' glare,

"Only 'cause he looked away when he did; another few seconds and it would've been a different story. Add that to your records Chrome-Dome, don't look him in the eye – yeah, yeah, yuck it up," having let the inopportune pun slip he folded his arms as even his team mates snickered, plotting revenge as Robin, fingers steepled in thought, spoke again,

"So, if this is true and I don't doubt you Raven, he's not really a threat to us, normal humans I mean."

"Not directly," she affirmed, though such reassurance was tempered with a warning, "I'd say your chance of injury is directly related to how close you're standing to the nearest demon. It's on or off; if you're not a demon you don't really register, if you are he kills you."

"So how are you still alive?"

Even as he said it he knew he'd opened mouth and inserted foot; Batman was a role-model for many things but being a team player was definitely not one of them. The Dark Knights' absolute determination to reach the truth regardless of the cost was admirable in some ways but it was so easy to get lost in such a relentless mindset, a cost Robin knew was often born by the friends who had stuck with him regardless of his obsessions no matter how much he inadvertently hurt them. Even as the room hissed in a collective breath of reproach he was scrambling to cover his faux-pas and promising to somehow make it up to his team mates later; _but for now we really need to know the truth_ ;

"I mean," he went on, not looking at anyone as he daren't catch their accusing eyes, "I'm forever grateful he didn't and I'd have been first in line after Beast Boy to make sure of it, but if he's that black-and-white…"

"I am the one grey area," Raven interjected, not as insulted the others as she knew the Boy Wonder better than any of them; while being linked to him during his darkest hour she had realised exactly how linear and ordered his mind was; _almost enough to make me envious_ ; "as a cambion I'm exactly half-and-half, the switch perfectly balanced. He had to kill me but couldn't so this," she glanced at her wrist again, "was the only thing he could do. It's interfering with my magic and my demonic side, I can feel it, but how I don't know and I'll figure it out later. I also think I know where he came from and where he went after Trigon died – the demons were dead, so he went to find more." As the picture formed in her mind Jinx gave a low whistle, shaking her head as she realised exactly where the other sorceress was hinting at,

"Broke out of Hell after your father then dived back in; damn," she swore as Raven nodded, "he really is hardcore."

"Yeah, he is; file's labelled Rob, be on your desk first thing – nice name Sabrina." Jinx blinked in surprise,

"Really, Hardcore? And don't call me that," she demanded, hating any comparison to the fictional witch as Cyborg nodded,

"My first choice was Space Marine but that's a copywriting mess, Hardcore suits him; now as for you," he promptly switched tack and targets, cuffing Robin in a way that ruined his perfectly-gelled quiff, "go get the rest of the pizzas in and apologise to Raven for being an insensitive jerk."

"Fine, fine," he held his hands up in apology, grateful to see the Azarathian smirk; _at least she didn't take too much offence – I'll apologise properly later, maybe lay it on a bit thick and see if I can't embarrass her or the green bean_ ; "what's everyone's poison, and don't say more wine!"

XXX

It was when Robin, still in disgrace, was tidying the last of the empty cartons away that Gizmo, still toying with his frazzled backpack and wincing at a few bumps and scrapes, noticed the pre-occupation of one of his team-mates and gave him a nudge,

"Something on your mind Billy?"

"Yeah, just uh," the red-clad teen began, cold sweat beading on his neck as he realised he'd been caught out and the others were starting to pay attention as they rested replete after the feast, "just thinkin'…"

"Wondered what that noise was," Billy glared death at the smirking Mammoth before mustering his courage and carrying on,

"…something you said Miss Raven, 'bout that little gem you lost," the dark mage looked up at her name while the Five swapped perturbed glances; it seldom boded well when Billy Numerous broke out the pleasantries, "you said it was from, Trigon?"

"You can say his name; unless there's some phoenix in him he's not coming back," she told the room at large, trying to clamp down on the rush of fierce joy that surged through her as she announced her freedom aloud again, "and yes, that Gem was born of his fire."

"Glad to see it gone then," he chuckled weakly before biting the bullet, "but you also said it was _his_ portal and _he_ was to sire from it?" Not sure where he was going with the oblique questions, Raven nevertheless nodded cautiously,

"Yes…"

"So, it was his, and but it was in you for your prophesy-thing,"; _watching him think is like a slow-motion train wreck – oh, hang on, Houston we may have lift-off_ ; "does that mean you're, or you were one of them… I don't know the word, uh, you know, girl-and-boy people," let down by his less than stellar education he mimed clumsily, blushing as he tried not to look at her, "you got both bits 'cause of him?"

For a long second Raven was shocked, halfway between not understanding and not wanting to understand the question, then Cyborg let out an explosive snort and ducked behind the couch, she could see Robin whispering in Starfires' ear and made to head this line of inquiry off before it ended in terminal embarrassment,

"I am _not_ a hermaphrodite!"

"You sure?" _Traitor!_ ; even as her look of outraged betrayal blasted into the boy who'd been leant against the side of her seat Beast Boy merely smirked, "It explains the gravelly voice."

"And the cape," never one to shy away from poking the bear Gizmo gleefully stuck the boot in, "good to hide bulges."

"But she wears a leotard," Billy chipped in, embarrassed for lighting this touch-paper and trying to make amends, "that wouldn't hide… anything." _She's my little sister – she'll get over it – but… - big brother privilege invoked, tease your younger sibling – fine_ ; mental war over Cyborg clambered back over the couch in time to dump oil on the fire,

"D, depends how well she tapes up," he managed, grinning at Raven's open-mouthed stupefaction, "don't look at me like that Rae, at least I know why you fly everywhere now, stops the chafing!"

 _I am not hearing this_ ; cheeks molten red Raven let her face fall into her hands but even as outright laughter broke out and a now-enlightened Starfire appraised her with a look somewhere between amazement and hilarity she didn't feel cut off as she had in the past. True they were laughing at her but she'd internally laughed at most of them at one time or another – this was her turn on the ducking stool. Part of her, possibly Sloth, stated turnabout was fair play but Brave was already seizing the helm, calling at her to turn the tables with a deviously delicious revenge. Her magic was sluggish and summoning it was a struggle but the whips to her ego gave her the fuel; feathering a touch on all the right minds present she leant forwards in her seat and raised her hands for calm that, after a few more interesting theories about her gender, eventually settled,

"Believe it or don't; I don't care; but I said the truth, and anyway Billy was right," seeing him duck his head appreciatively she realised he really hadn't meant any offence and, touched a little by this, released him from the forthcoming enchantment, "any part of my fathers' influence is gone and he won't be siring from that gem anymore. After all," her lips split into a vicious grin as she clenched her fist suddenly, "I heard the _crunch!_ "

As six of the assembled promptly went white and folded over themselves at the unsubtle mental image she forced into their minds Raven allowed herself a victorious smirk, revelling in their agonised moans as she stretched languidly in her chair; _what do you know, Garfield was right about something_ ; she spared the shivering green bundle by the side of her seat a sympathetic look before grinning again; _pranks really are fun._

XXX

"Never thought I'd feel sorry for the devil," See-More declared in a high-pitched voice a few moments later, still not able to sit upright, "she's definitely a woman; only they're that cruel."

"And don't you forget it; skin me girl," Jinx told him, reaching a hand over the arm of the settee that Raven, after a second remembering what the unfamiliar gesture meant, tapped softly with her own, "treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen." Glancing over from where she was helping Robin up from where he'd slid off the settee, Starfire raised an eyebrow,

"What would they be keen for after their grabnarks have been mangled?"

"Not having it happen again," the Boy Wonder groaned, knowing he wasn't physically hurt but feeling it thanks to Raven's empathic manipulations, "is it too late for a sorry?"

"You never know until you try," she dead-panned, thinly amused at the results of her first serious practical joke as one of its main targets managed to painfully lever himself back upright with the aid of a kitchen stool. Jinx saw this as well and, feeling slightly protective of the other magic user, turned her fire on one of the chief instigators against her,

"How come you were affected Cy; sympathy pain?"

In the midst of the shocked gasps Jinx sat primly, looking for all the world like one of her favourite animals that had got the cream as the mechanical member of the Titans froze, then slowly stumped around to glare at her,

"What the hell…?"

"That's what she said," Jinx snipped in neatly, raising an eyebrow as Cyborg was left agape at her cheek, "might wanna get onto upgrading that bit of _hard_ ware Tin-can; three-and-a-half-inch floppy just doesn't cut it these days."

"Shots fired!" Beast Boy managed over the collective 'ooohhh' from the audience, the green teen grateful to see a hint of a grin peeping across Ravens' lips as their big-brother figure looked stupefied for a second before rallying, his bionic eye blazing,

"You do not wanna go there Jinx, I'm warning you!"

"Warning heeded; I definitely am nut going there, nut at ball," she answered, smirking coyly she needled her newest target, "doubt there's much to see anyway."

"Daaammmmn girl," Gizmo managed in amazement before realising he was sat slightly between the two now-waring parties and hastily trying to meld with the settee as Cyborg swelled with outrage before, to universal relief and astonishment, letting it go in a huge exhalation, raising his palms in a supplicating gesture,

"No, no, once again I gotta be the biggest man in the room," he seemed to speak half to himself before locking eyes with his tormentor, "she's just projecting. I'm half-machine and she's half-and-half, what's your excuse for having nothing to show – puberty was unkind?" Fortunately before Raven could do much more than raise an eyebrow at his casual slander Jinx had snapped up the bait, her eyes glowing pink as she leant forwards,

"And you mean _what_ by that?"

"Well," Cy drawled for a second, cycling through his options to one-up her previous disses, "put it like this, if Victorias' are a secret yours are a mystery." Flushing despite herself as she watched most of the other eight teens collectively wince Jinx dragged nails into the armrest, teeth bared as she jerked her other thumb into her chest,

"You wanna piece of me Rusty Nuts?"

"You got nothing worth wanting Tic-Tacs; I've seen more meat on one of Minty Fresh's' toothpicks."

"There will be blood!" Billy lamented, looking like he was praying as his team mates' cheeks bloomed scarlet; without a word Jinx hurled herself to her feet, Cyborg not backing down an inch as she threw herself between Robin and Starfire, standing on the settee to look him in the eye. Either not noticing or caring that Starfire was looking up curiously at things normally hidden under her skirt (Robin, on the other hand, had his gaze firmly in his lap, his aching grabnarks warning him against annoying the other sorceress in the room) the hexmistress leant forwards and breathed her next words directly into his smug grin,

"Overdrive Four," she stated slowly, pointing towards the inert Gamestation without breaking eye-contact, "Breakneck Junction, Max speed – you man enough Clockwork?"

"Bring it on Cats-Eyes."

XXX

Consciousness returned slowly, trickling down his mind like water through a sponge as his body reactivated one leaden limb at a time. Slowly blinking his eyes open and re-orientating himself as being in the space between kitchen and living room of the Tower, Robin took a few moments to determine if anything other than the swaying red thing he could see out the corner of his eye was wrong with the picture. First thing he checked was his mask, smirking to himself when he realised it was still there; _call him a kook but asking Question how he kept his mask on was one of the best things I ever did_ ; then he checked himself over as he wriggled out of the sleeping bag he could just about remember dragging from his room before the lights went out. Everything seemed to be in working order, though his nethers still tingled a touch as he stretched out, scratched the back of his now-ruined hairstyle and tried to recall both what had happened last night; _well, that's obvious – we were all just acting like teenagers_.

The sudden thought made him stifle a snort of laughter, hand over his lips as he tried to avoid waking anyone up, least of all the girl sprawled on the kitchen countertop only a few feet from where he'd ended up crashed out, the Tamaranean warrior unconcerned by mere human concerns such as blankets in the face of a 'party of slumber'. Gazing down at her sleeping face and seeing Silkie curled up at her hip, Robin couldn't help the secretive smile flowing over his face, one he only allowed himself when he was sure no-one else would see it. Ever since she had literally crashed into his world he'd known he was never going to back to the person he had been in Gotham; no matter how long a shadow Batman cast over him, Robin knew he would never be fully eclipsed by that seductive but terrifying call of the night while Starfire was there illuminating him with her courage, her adorable cluelessness and her atrocious cuisine; _though having said that…_

Thinking about the abominable slop brought back memories of the previous night, starting with Jinx and Cyborgs' little tete-a-tete; the two hadn't stopped glaring daggers at each other until the game was booted up and had seized the controllers as though they were duelling pistols. Along with the others Robin had cheered and hollered for his team mate as Titan had fought H.I.V.E and the look of crushing despair on Cyborgs' face when he'd mashed one of the buttons too hard and his car, nose in the lead with the last lap begging, span off the track had been absolutely priceless, Jinx left to savour her victory despite his continued denunciations that her bad luck had hexed him. _And, of course, someone had to break out the armoury at that point - we'll be picking foam bullets out of the carpet for weeks_ ; even as he tried to glare at his oblivious team mate he just didn't have the heart to hold it for long; s _till, hell of a training session, and it gave the two gamers a way to try and kill each other without killing each other_. For that he was eternally grateful; after their challenge the warring sorceress and machine-man had been trading increasingly sharp barbs until, forewarned by a Tamaranean battlecry, everyone had scattered to avoid Starfires' strafing run. Dropping an armful of loaded foam pellet guns and digital life counters set to 99, the highest they could go, Starfire had promised the full pan of the Broth of Victory she'd been making during the game to the winner as everyone grabbed a gun and went running, the five-minute countdown on their wristbands ticking down as soon as they all had one on.

The result had been utter bedlam; Robin had tried to impose a no powers rule but swiftly been forced to capitulate, hastily sealing off the more delicate areas of the Titan base before he and the other nine players rampaged through it with abandon. There were no teams and even less loyalty, abilities were abused to attain priceless shots or lose tenacious foes (who would have guessed Raven would be such a ghost with her teleportation – that bore thinking about for in-field work when she was back at her peak) and he was proud that even without powers he'd been fourth-to-last eliminated, a double-knockout with with Gizmo after the two had stalked each other through a variety of storage rooms, not realising they were both on their last life until their fatal shots hit simultaneously.

After a brief laugh at the irony the two had dragged themselves upstairs, collapsing drenched with sweat in the main common room with the other eliminated competitors as Cyborg, Jinx and Beast Boy were left to finish the game. There were no doubts about the eventual winner, a tower seeming to shake from the 'booyah!' that echoed from its lower levels, the originator of such jubilation bowing himself into the common room some minutes later to ironic cheers and with both former competitors nagging at his flanks and accusing him of outrageous cheating. Fortunately Cyborgs' smugness had been neatly extinguished by Starfire's presentation of the Tamaranean Broth of Victory, a gloopy, viscous mess akin to a cross between primordial soup and an escapee part of Plasmus. Along with the others Robin had watched in ill-disguised glee as his would-be excuses shrivelled in the face of her earnest expectation and his face had swiftly followed at the taste of the concoction, though the devious sod had gotten his revenge on them all by demanding it be shared out to the others as 'without players, there would be no victory'; _and I doubt the house ferns will ever recover. Still, she got one convert to Tamaranean cuisine, that was a surprise_ ; rubbing his eyes the Titan leader glanced around the rest of the room and quickly surveyed the carnage.

Everyone appeared to be where they'd collapsed during the post-battle movie marathon, though even as he'd retreated to dig his sleeping bag out of his room he'd been amazed to see the H.I.V.E. Five already settling down in a manner that had surprised him, declining the offer of rooms. From where he was he could see Mammoth on the floor, a cushion under his chin his only compromise for comfort as Gizmo was between his shoulder-blades, covered with a blanket and snoring like a miniature buzz-saw. The tips of Jinxs' hair poked out from one end of the settee, her feet tucked up where she was top-and-tailing with See-More as the cyclops's head rested on the back of where Billy Numerous was curled up like a cat. _What was it he told Star – he grew up sleeping on chairs and car seats, can't get comfortable any other way_ ; an uncomfortable pang pricked the heroes' conscience – though he didn't agree with their choices, he knew many villains became villains simply because they fell on hard times or had no other choice. Overseeing all was Cyborg, wires from one of the secondary charging ports scattered throughout the Towers fitted into his He was, however, jarred from such musings when he realised he was being watched and turned his attention to the watcher; the two regarded each other for several seconds before Mammoth folded his massive hands under his chin and batted his eyelids several times,

"Like what you see hero-boy?" Robin blinked, blinked again and then shuddered,

"Please never do that again," he asked deadpan, "I don't think I can afford another therapist." The older boy snorted,

"If you had any sense you'd not need one," he pointed out, nodding past the Boy Wonders' shoulder, "you and her…?" Guessing his insinuations, Robin tried to answer suavely whilst wrestling down a blush,

"It's complicated."

"She's an alien princess with metahuman powers linked to positivity, a knockout body, an extendable tongue and she cooks; it should be simple." _Well, when you put it like tha…_ ; at that instant Robins' thoughts caught up with the larger metahumans' insinuation and he really did blush, glaring at the prostate villain with hard eyes,

"That's disgusting!"

"Not if it's done right," Robin felt he should have been outraged on his teammates' behalf but Mammoth wasn't leering, in fact if anything he looked surprisingly like Cyborg when the half-android was in full elder-brother mode as he fixed the hero with a piercing gaze, "girls like that drop into your life maybe once if you're lucky – don't be an idiot."

 _Ouch_ ; left undefended against such brutal honesty Robin could only nod; _was it Bruce who said friends tell you what you want to know, enemies tell you what you need to know? No, that was Alfred_ ;

"I try not to be, and anyway regarding her cooking you earned a prize," he chuckled, Mammoth raising an eyebrow and shifting slightly as Gizmo, still on his back and sleeping soundly, squirmed a little on his unusual pillow, "never thought Tamaranean dishes could be contained within just one stomach."

"I've eaten worse." Robin shuddered at the thought before glancing at the current spokesman for the Five,

"So, when you're all awake we can drop you off around your base and we call it all quits until the next time you go on a robbing spree?"

"Sounds fair, though a hot shower would be nice before we go, Giz is still trying to fix ours," Robin considered this a fair trade and nodded, though as he did he caught sight of something and, despite his stance on relationships between superheroes and heroines, found himself smiling slightly.

He'd been surprised Raven had joined in the free-for-all battle but he reckoned she'd forfeited at some stage; certainly she'd gotten in a few shots on him before mysteriously disappearing; but he doubted she'd seen past the first ten minutes of the movie before drifting into slumber. However she hadn't gone into the darkness alone; as the two smallest and slimmest Titans the grey and green members of the team were just about able to sleep side by side on her chair, something Robin guessed Raven would do something about as soon as she woke up; _though hopefully BB will be up before then, or he will if he has any sense and-stroke-or survival instinct_. Even as the thought crossed his mind he shook his head – he'd suspected the two held something for each other; Beast Boy certainly did, refusing to let the grimmer team member seclude herself even when she expressly stated she wanted to be left alone; and as he noted the green arm tenderly folded over the swaddled cloak he felt his suspicions were confirmed. _I should really take a picture, but I won't_ ; it was a sweet moment, not one to be later soured by ribald jokes and teasing, though as he committed the scene to memory he suddenly realised something about how the two of them were laid and what Beast Boys' hand was covering over the smooth material of the cambions' cloak; _and was that the hand… yes, yes it was! That's interesting, I wonder if it means anything – I'll keep an eye out…_

Despite it being a fleeting observation Robin took it as seriously as he did anything else to do with his team and, because of that observation, some years later on one of the happiest days of his life and after hearing Victors' best man speech, he was able to state his observations out loud and then observe their dumbstruck expressions when, in front of the whole reception, he was able to prove it beyond doubt…

XXX

"Better add this one to the list then," Beast Boy sighed, "leave it to Rob to document everything – seriously who gives a dossier for a wedding present?"

"The second-greatest detective in the world?" Raven suggested innocuously, shaking her head against their shared pillows, "Still, can't deny he was right."

"Sadly not, obsessive git," Garfields' comment lacked heat as he recalled some choice annotations of the Bird Boys' diary, each one detailing a time where both parts of their anatomy touched by the otherworldly being so long ago had come together. From pulling the red-faced and exhausted mage from the floor a few days after the H.I.V.E. Five had left the tower (Jinx under extreme protest, claiming she needed to both marry the power shower and make Cyborgs' life miserable) to ending the last slow dance of the annual Titan reunion ball with an extra spin onto one knee to ask for her hand, the fist Hardcore had bumped had covered the mark left in his wake in all manner of scenarios. Since realising this during their wedding reception Raven had tried to work out if there was any residual magic or other compulsion but had found nothing, either because there was nothing there or because it was a type of magic she didn't know she couldn't say, and in the end neither of them particularly cared, this little quirk being just one of a multitude that had bound them together as they'd matured through fire, fear and supervillain attack. The two lay in companionable silence until Garfield shivered with a suppressed laugh and asked,

"Reckon Cy's figured it out yet?"

"Hopefully not," Raven answered, recalling the latest escalation of the ongoing war, "she's just lucky his scanners can't penetrate magical concealment, just as well considering what he said he'd do to the guy who swapped his car paints around."

"I'm surprised the colour didn't give it away," Changeling admitted, recalling the look on the Cyborgs' face following his precious baby emerging from the spray booth a hot shade of fuchsia, "reckon he'll propose soon?"

"Oh definitely," Raven assured him, "he'll get down on one knee by the end of the year, even if I have to pull a Mammoth and knock his leg out the park."

 _And people say we were a match made in Hell_ ; lightly kissing her closest shoulder at the same time as stifling giggles Changeling thought back to the fractious relationship of their joint best friends. In the aftermath of Trigons' final death things had fundamentally changed between the Five and the Titans; though the villainous group still caused trouble their hearts didn't seem to be in it, and neither did the Titans retaliate as much as they perhaps should have done – more than once they even teamed up to take down other villains threatening Jump City. Throughout all of their interactions, however, one thing that never changed was the friction between Jinx and Cyborg, the two of them renewing their rivalry at every turn be it in battle or during unexpected encounters in the streets, and when Cyborg had finally achieved his life-long dream of entering the ranks of the Justice League it had only escalated further. The first the Titans had heard about it had been an infuriated Jinx all but hammering the door of the Tower flat and demanding the insufferable robot show himself, the rest of the H.I.V.E. sheepishly at her heels and drawing straws to decide who was going to try calming her down.

Eventually the story came out, Cyborgs' informing one of the honorary Justice League about the existence of another magic user in Jump City resulting in Zatanna paying the villains a visit under the illusion of her tip-off. The resultant 'attack' had pushed them all to their absolute limit and left Jinx herself battered, humiliated, drained of every scrap of magic she possessed and then amazed when the elder mage dropped her disguise, stated she had a talent for the arcane arts and told her to look up the show she'd be performing in the future, stating she might be in the market for an apprentice soon. More importantly the magician also accidentally let slip the name of her tip-off and Jinx was now out for blood and oil, demanding to be admitted to the Watchtower to 'do the world a favour and shove an electro-magnet somewhere a cotton bud would be kinder',

"Though fortunately it didn't come to that," Raven remembered, chuckling slightly as she recalled watching the horn-haired girls rampage through the space station on live-screen after she'd been granted access clearance from Flash, who hadn't stopped smirking for days after the situation had been explained to him. Unfortunately he'd had just enough decency to avoid showing the face-to-face but, given that Cyborg had eventually answered the communicator with a large red mark on his cheek and Jinx wrapped around his neck in a shameless hug that she refused to relinquish even as he fielded questions from the others, the result being a torturous interrogation she made infinitely worse at every turn,

"Not yet but give it time," Garfield answered with a chuckle before sobering up, the memory of the next time the two enemies had come together sore in his mind, "still he can say he hates her all she wants, he was there after the Big One."

"We all were, for each other," Raven added sombrely, recalling the day Jump City had shaken with awful clarity, as always forever grateful the Tower had been empty when the earthquake had struck and all but reduced it to rubble. One of the largest quakes to strike the mainland in years, the only mercy that it hadn't been generated in the ocean and sent in a tsunami to finish the job on the devastated city. It had been a panic on a level not even the most powerful supervillain had ever managed, destruction even the Justice League together would have been hard-pressed to contain and repair, and the worst of the aftermath had been largely averted by one individual. Even as the battered emergency services tried to swing into action the streets had filled with red-clad bodies; as the Titans rallied and began to co-ordinate with the city government Billy Numerous had taken matters into his innumerable hands. Rescues, fighting fires, helping search parties, shifting rubble, re-uniting families and manning aid stations or co-ordinating the movement of people on the ground as a one-man radio network Billy had done it all and, at the end of the Jump citys' darkest day, become the final casualty as he paid the ultimate price for his heroism.

It had been swift, the mental trauma of so many clones dispersing at once resulting in a stroke so massive it had been instantly fatal, but that was little comfort to the rest of his devastated team. If Trigons' death had marked the H.I.V.E. Five's distancing themselves from villainy Billys had shattered their relationship with it utterly, all four present for the city-wide unveiling of the stone monument to remember the fallen six months later and left inconsolable when Green Arrow, speaking for the Justice League, had finished his brief eulogy and symbolically engraved the initials JL next to the name William Strayer with one of his arrows. From there the Five had fully disbanded, Jinx taking up Zatanna's offer of apprenticeship in the art after exhausting her tears and grief on Cyborgs' stoic shoulder and the others to their own devices, though the Titans kept tabs on both Gizmos' minor tech start-up and See-Mores' end of pier caricature service. Mammoth, after ensuring his younger charges were settled and well enough, had simply left Jump and drifted, working on the road where super strength and toughness could be gainfully employed though he kept in touch with his friends and, surprisingly, Starfire as well, calling in on the Tamaranean on the rare occasions he returned to the rebuilt city to share copious helpings of the 'Dessert of Friendship', much to Robins' dread.

 _We've all grown up_ ; the thought somehow didn't seem as frightening to Garfield as it once had, back when all he'd been interested in was beating the bad guys, hanging with his friends and trying to snaffle the last slice of pizza without anyone noticing; _for better and worse we've all changed. Though for some of us_ ; rolling his eyes sideways he pulled slightly, Raven rolling over and partially onto his chest after a seconds' token resistance; _that change was definitely for the best_ ;

"Sorry for waking you," he apologised, knowing it was hard for her to drop off at the moment and grateful for her answering chuckle,

"You didn't, I was waiting for you to fall asleep to see if it would happen again," Raven told him, nuzzling slightly into his shoulder, "though in this case you didn't even wait that long."

"More data for the observation book," Garfield reminded her with a wry smile, "you're free to hold my hand any time you know?" Raven quirked an eyebrow,

"That so? I'll remind you of that a few months from now."

"Go right ahead," the anamorph told her, a familiar shot of nervous excitement shooting through him as his free hand ghosted over the slight swell just below his wifes' stomach and what it would soon mean, "though I reserve the right to squeal like a little girl throughout the whole thing, assuming I don't pass out first."

"You do and you'll be in the doghouse for the next six months, literally."

"You're a cruel woman Mrs Logan; I must be a masochist."

"Since when has that been a secret; you were on a team with me for years."

"True," he admitted before his hand found her wrist again, thumb tracing the slightly raised scar over and over as he looked into her beautiful lilac eyes, "do you miss it Rae?"

She was silent for a long moment and he felt a twinge of unease that he might have been a little too direct before to his relief she shook her head,

"Sometimes," she admitted, knowing that even now her powers would never be quite what they were in her youth; whatever the stranger had done had scarred more than just her flesh. Though she still sought out the exact mechanisms, whatever the mark was severely diminished the powers granted to her by her demonic nature, preventing her from calling on the strength that could have levelled the world for good or for ill. Nevermore had also changed, her emotions seemingly purged from all but the faintest trace of her darker half, even Rage recognisable as more human than monster as the crimson mark seemed etched in every surface, burnt onto every field and engraved in every wall, a physical manifestation of power far greater than her own or her fathers.

Despite her loss of power and the gruelling training she'd had to endure to recover even a shadow of her former self, however, Raven couldn't find it in herself to hate the stranger who'd enacted the change as in diminishment came freedom. Whereas before it was a continual struggle to contain the volatile power through meditation and self-denial, since that day she'd had to work to summon and channel her strength almost regardless of her emotional strength; _and boy did I find that out the hard way?_ She shivered at the memory; after meditating and seeking guidance from within herself for some days after the branding Raven had emerged and found her friends being run through a training circuit by Robin, though this was quickly suspended upon seeing her in the flesh again. She had explained her initial conclusions and wondered aloud if experiencing strong emotions could be done under test conditions, like that scary film that had caused such trouble before; in hindsight she'd been an idiot for not running the second she'd seen three of the assembled swap glances before breaking out in identical evil grins.

With a victorious cry of 'vengeance for our grabnarks' Robin, Cyborg and Beast Boy had piled into her and to her horror she'd quickly discovered she was a lot more ticklish in a lot more places than she'd ever imagined. How long the torture had carried on she'd never know; she distinctly remembered begging Robin not to take her boots off at once point and that Starfire had misunderstood her pleas for help and pitched in with the rest of the team before she was able to snatch a breath to correct her error. She was left a shaking, sweaty mess, not even able to slap Beast Boy upside the head when he peeled her off the floor afterwards but, as the only damage had been the free weights thrown around the place and a few large cracks in the gym mirrors, Robin was content to declare her conclusions sound before embracing her softly, welcoming her back to the Titans officially. From there it had been a slow integration into normal life while mastering her powers as much as she could; _power for normality, a trade every super makes at some stage. Still, enough of that for now_ ; another pressing need made itself known with a low growl and at her husbands' groan she could only rub her hands together in glee; _time to enjoy a pregnancy plus_ ;

"You cannot be serious," Garfield moaned, pulling his hand down his face, "can't you get your cravings at a reasonable hour?"

"Well, I could always go for my default option – wow, didn't know you'd be training with Wally again…"

"Leave my blood out of this," the shapeshifter demanded with a shiver, having vacated the covers with alarming alacrity, "go on, hit me with it."

"I feel like," Raven began, trying to voice what her taste-buds were aching for, "something bitter-sour, but with crunch."

"Salad?"

"For the crunch but it needs some flavour; a nice dressing, something sharp."

"One sour-cream salad wrap coming up," Garfield announced, taking half a step towards the door before pausing and leaning down to press his lips softly to the tiny crease in her brow where once a jewel of condensed evil had nestled, "you know I love you right, crazy as you send me?" Even as her forehead tingled Raven gave a playful laugh,

"You stood in front of the doom of my father, that proves either you love me or you're already crazy."

"Couldn't it be both?"

"Get out, I'm starving," she demanded, brandishing the pillow she snatched up like a weapon towards his fleeing green buttocks before settling back down, eyes on the door as it swung shut behind him and a last whisper on her lips that she knew his enhanced hearing would notice, "and, crazy as you are, it hasn't stopped me loving you yet."

A/N: Okay, took a little longer than I expected but I still managed to best the challenge; hope you enjoyed it sprout. However as I am now officially an 'old git' I supposed I'd best explain some of the disses Jinx and Cyborg used to the current T-rated audience:

Floppy: Back in the day before I-cloud, USB or even (gasp) CDs, the only way of storing data was a re-writable plastic square called a floppy disk; if you open Microsoft Word, you can see one on the Save button. The most common size for these floppy disks was 3 and a half inches and yes, the jokes just wrote themselves from there.

Tic-Tacs: Short for 'two Tic-Tacs on an ironing board', this is an extremely derogatory way of describing a lady with a small bust (for the sake of completeness, a lady with the opposite problem may be described as 'two fried eggs on a slice of toast' or 'two beachballs on a flat lilo').

If anyone is else in interested, the full details for the challenge that spawned this story were:

The Titans are facing off against the Five until one of the bigger villains acts and forces them to work together.

There's a cross-over with the hero/protagonist of a non-comic franchise, who helps the heroes fight off the bad guy but isn't the full focus of the story (hopefully you've all worked out who Genocide/Hardcore actually is – there's a clue in the title); for bonus points, it can't be the hero of a franchise you've already written about.

H.I.V.E. Five and Titans share a victory scene.

Raven must legitimately laugh at one of Beast Boy's jokes.

Must be written within a month.

As I know nothing about the Teen Titans I spent some time researching (wikis, video clips and, of course, this site) and came up with this quick snippet – hope you all enjoyed it and, if I get time in the future and finish one of my other projects, I might have a chance to come up with a fuller story for the Titans in time, it looks like it's got potential. Hopefully catch you all in the future when I've got time to write more again – until then, enjoy what you read and good luck in your own writings.


	2. Chapter 2 - Hunter-Killer

**Hunter-Killer**

A/N: Another challenge from my ever-helpful younger family members to celebrate a recent milestone; challenge details can be found at the end of the story. Hope you enjoy this one-shot and I'm hopeful I'll have a little more time in the near future to get back on with my other fics; until then though, enjoy the dawning of a second doomsday in Jump City!

The show plays on, even at the end of the world…

XXX

"What in the hey…?" A titanium finger rubbed a bald scalp in confusion, "Why are we on lock-down?"

Needless to say the drawn steel shutters didn't answer and the half-robotic teen wirelessly hooked up to the Titan Tower computer network, immediately noting the exact time the system had engaged; _must have been a mistake, says the lockdown was manually engaged from in here._ Idly realising it had been more or less five hours since their little family had been sealed off from the outside world he began electronically reaching for the override when a sudden exclamation made him look around,

"A most glorious morning to you friend-Cy…" despite the potentially serious situation the robotic teen had to mask a smile; _so, there is something that can stop a Tamaranean benediction apart from Raven's glower_ ; "… where is the morning friend-Cyborg – is this an Earth custom?"

 _"_ No Star, just a glitch in the system; lockdown fired off while we were asleep. I'll put it right, just fire up the grill while I'm busy."

"As you wish friend, I will make use of the oven – it has been too long since I baked a _glorp'ga_ loaf." Mentally shuddering at the thought and making a mental note to find Silkie prior to starting grilling (as much of an annoyance as the little larvae could be, his iron stomach for his owners' cooking made up for it), Cyborg mentally imputed the lockdown release code and hit enter, turning halfway around before realising he wasn't hearing anything disengaging,

"What the… did we have a power cut last night or something?"

"Problems friend?"

"Yeah," he replied non-committedly, sensing Star over his shoulder as he tried the code again, "can't get this thing open, the code's either been reset or changed somehow."

"Could our computer systems have been scythed?"

"Hacked," he corrected her, concentrating on the electronic records of the past six hours, "and no, nothing's got in since we got back from the Pizza Palace last night."

"Really?" Even as he rolled his organic eye towards her, affronted she doubted his record-keeping he suddenly followed her jade gaze, realising her higher vantage point had let her see something he'd missed, "Then why is that window broken?"

XXX

 _Now here's something you don't see every day_ ; as he couldn't see in the dark Robin was grateful for his Tamaranean… teammates natural radiance – by the soft green light of her eyes the sight of Cyborg rooting around on his hands and knees was one he would savour for a long time; _and lord bless Alfred for suggesting spy-sized flash-less cameras – the blackmail never ends_ ;

"Dare I ask?"

"Rob," unusually Cyborg reacted first, shooting to his feet so fast it was more luck that judgement he didn't dent his skull on Starfires' jaw, "the very man. Get over here and tell me what you think happened."

"What I think happened or what I think was about to happen," the Boy Wonder teased before becoming more serious, "what's with the shutters down?"

"We are unsure friend-Robin," Starfire said dolefully, toecaps barely skimming the carpet, "friend-Cyborg believed there the system suffered an itch and activated the lock-down…"

"But then Star saw this," the larger teen took over, indicating the floor around them, "I've fired off every scan I can think of but there's nothing in the Tower that shouldn't be, though I can't get into our private rooms."

"Star go knock BB and Raven," at the first glint of shattered glass the mask had slammed down and Robin was all business, "tell them there's an emergency and to get here now. Don't set off the alarms, if someone is in here we don't let them know we're onto them."

"As you wish friend-Robin," recognising the potential severity of the situation the Tamaranean departed without a sound, her favourite team mate squatting down beside the Cyborg, picturing the scene in the mind Batman had honed to a razor, announcing his findings a moment later,

"This was crushed from the outside." Hearing his suspicions confirmed Cyborg swore,

"Shutters missed them, gotta make them faster."

"No, the shutters didn't miss; I think they did this. Look at the glass," a flash of Robins' hands illustrated the fall of the broken pane, "this wasn't shattered with a hammer or blown up, it was hit with a large but heavy object moving at a steady but slow speed – it had to have been the shutter. The window wasn't open last night was it?"

"You know it wasn't, they're timed to shut two minutes after lights go off in here. This doesn't make sense Rob; this window was open, the time-stamp says lock-down happened last night and the code's been wiped…"

"And friend-Beast Boy is missing!"

The sudden thunderclap of noise made them both jump, at eye-level with Starfire for an instant before hitting the floor again; once the adrenaline left, however, it all started to make sense,

"That little grass-stain," Cyborg grated, "as soon as I get hold of him I'll cook him in his own tofu and hang him outside for the birds!"

"Not if I get my hands on him first," Robin promised darkly, already considering potential punishments for this latest breach of protocol by the youngest Titan, "alright guys, looks like a false alarm. Beast Boy must have hit the lockdown and dived out the window before the shutters came down to lock us in." Starfire cocked her head,

"But why would friend-Beat Boy do such a thing?" There was an exasperated sigh from behind her, Raven swooping towards the kitchen like a ghost,

"Why does Beast Boy do anything," the gothic teen declared cuttingly, clicking on the kettle with a thought and reaching for her favourite herbal teabags, "he's living proof of the Chaos theory." Cyborg snorted and gave his dark little sister a thumbs-up as Starfire looked distraught,

"But, but if we are locked in the tower, how will we visit the mall of shopping friend-Raven; if we cannot open the down of locks we will have to postpone our trip."

"Tragedy," Raven deadpanned before Robin stepped in,

"Don't worry Star, I'm sure Beast Boy will have gotten bored with his joke and we'll be out of here by then, and even if not I'm sure Raven could teleport you both there." He cringed as the goth-girl knifed him with an evil look but fortunately his doubtless-agonising demise was put on hold as Starfire rounded on her friend, the glee around her so strong it was almost tangible,

"Friend-Raven, you are capable of such feats – oh this is a glorious day!" Not deigning to reply the Azarathean merely poured boiling water into her favourite mug, pausing only to inhale the aroma of her tea as it, and Cyborg, stewed,

"…come in you little booger – right," the eldest of the Titans snapped his arm covering closed, his mechanical eye blazing as it lasered in on the fridge, "if it's in there and it ain't meat it's going in the garbage disposal!"

"Not answering?"

"Nope, communicators' off but he's got it on him, look," the main screen of the tower blinked into life, silhouetting Raven in a map or lines until she moved side by side with Starfire, taking dainty sips of her drink, "he's on the mainland so at least the tracker's working."

"Something for me to home in on," Raven commented, a dark expression on her face, "give me a moment and you can ask him what this whole prank was in per…"

She was cut off and the whole tower was stunned into silence by an ominous grumbling, all seven eyes drawn to the sorceress's midriff as her stomach suddenly gurgled again. Glances were swapped and grins hastily smothered; amusing as the situation was, poking fun at Raven was about as safe as kicking a sleeping tiger,

"Uhh, skip supper last night Rae?" Cyborg had just enough time to brace himself as her eyes shot towards him, even larger than normal in her pale face as she hastily deposited her mug on the side before half-stumbling, half-flying down the corridor, hunched over and hugging her audibly-complaining digestive tract. Her cloak flapped for an instant, then an instant more before it was swallowed by the darkness of the corridor that led towards the living areas of the tower. Everyone else blinked after her in shock before Starfire shattered the silence,

"Is friend-Raven ill – ah, should I make the soup of _vorslok_ to settle her stomachs?"

"Pretty sure Azaratheans only have one stomach Star," Cyborg pointed out, blinking after his little sister as he tried to work out what had happened, "got anything Rob?"

"Yeah," the Boy Wonder confirmed, carefully fishing a sodden little something out of the bin, "Beast Boy's funeral ticket."

As he saw the small, sodden tea bag pinched between his team leaders' fingers Cyborg hastily put two and two together, came up with five and simultaneously commended the green beans' mortal courage and immortal soul; _assuming he has one left by the time Raven gets through with him_ ;

"Okay," he sighed heavily, meeting his leaders' mask squarely, "he's toast."

XXX

After asking Starfire to check on Raven (and explaining the purpose of Ex-Lax, something that left Robin red-faced and Cyborg near hysteria), the two at least semi-human teens left convened as Cyborg threw the joke teabag into the bin again,

"Well this puts a different spin on things."

"Yeah," it was the tone of Robin's voice that made him look over, "and not in a good way."

"I know that look; hit me with it."

"Something's wrong," Robin said, fingers already flying over the keyboard as he arranged the evidence in his mind, "Beast Boy's a joker but this is beyond a joke…"

"Never stopped him before – sorry."

"Right – anyway, you definitely can't lift the lockdown?"

"No, you think he's done that?" At Robins' nod Cyborg's expression also grew graver; it was true Beast Boy had risked the safety of the tower's security before but only in ignorance; it had never been as potentially malicious as this,

"So, the way I see it our missing team mate has, at night, locked the tower down from the inside despite the damage it's done to our window; say what you like but he rarely breaks anything, Raven's worse than him when it comes to damages; and made sure we can't get out by disabling both our potential escape routes."

"Both? He only… no," the sudden realisation made even Cyborgs' steel spine chill, "the joke teabag?"

"Takes Raven out the picture, really neatly," turning, Robin faced his teammate directly, not breaking eye contact as he stated his conclusion plainly, "he's rogue, and he doesn't want us following him."

Cyborg had to reboot his own brain; the idea that Beast Boy, the grass-stain, had potentially abandoned the Titans was so far-fetched it didn't compute, leaving him with only the most basic language possible to express his disbelief,

"But, but why?"

"That's what I don't know and what we need to find out, fast," Robin said, fingers a blur over the keyboard, "if anyone attacks the city they're sitting ducks and whatever his reasons Beast Boy's responsible for that. I'm not saying that's his reason," he was quick to clarify, "but we have to bear in mind he could be working with someone else, willingly or otherwise."

"Another… you know?" He didn't say the name, he didn't need to as Robin tensed, teeth gritted before carrying on,

"More than one of our enemies has that capacity and we know B's not the most resistant to hypnosis from Mad Mods' screens."

"I'd believe that over him turning traitor; step aside," despite his obsessive tendencies Robin was sensible enough to yield to the better man for the job, Cyborg interfacing himself to the computer directly, "I've not done this before but it should be possible to… right, I can isolate everything electronic that went into B's room last night, and if he switched anything on."

"Do it, play it on speakers." Cyborg nodded, Robin catching a flash of movement from the corner of his eye and beckoning Starfire over, silently instructing her not to disturb the now-silent giant at the console,

"Friend-Raven is… unwell," the princess admitted delicately, "but she assures us she will be recovered enough to, ah, put the boot to friend-Beast Boys' _grabnarks_ shortly."

"Glad to hear it Star, good work," the Tamaranean beamed under the praise before wincing,

"Why did you make such an unpleasant noise friend-Cyborg?"

"Huh?" Starting from his immersion the older teen glanced down, "What noise?"

"You did not hear that keening?" Seeing the nonplussed expressions Starfire made to explain, "It was a sound not unlike the whistle for dogs."

"A dog-whistle, when?"

"Just now friend-Cyborg…"

"Replay," Robin broke in over both of them, another pop-up box blinking into life on the screen, "the last few seconds Cy; Star cover your ears." As soon as she'd done so Cyborg replayed the time and watched the spike on the audiogram with amazement,

"It was a dog-whistle, the pitches match perfectly; it was an alarm! He set an alarm only he would wake up from, the walls would stop it getting through to you Star."

"But what triggered it; can you tell what's going into his room?"

"There shouldn't be anything, let me do a full scan," tense moments passed, Robin and Starfire both craning in eagerly as Cyborg sank into a trance before something else flashed up on screen, "booyah, there it is; it's a radio signal, took me a while to narrow it down."

"Radio? I didn't think he… never mind that, can you tell what it said?"

"No, the signals' constantly going through the tower but only interfaced with our system to trigger the alarm, I guess to a specific word or phrase?"

"Hypnosis maybe, a suggestion?"

"If it was our problems are bigger than we imagined Rob," Cyborgs' face was grave as he pointed at the sine wave now repeating over the screen, "I just isolated the frequency; it was a police radio transmission."

XXX

As soon as Cyborg had made that declaration Robin began to pace, mind racing a mile a minute as he tried to get the pieces to fit; _Beast Boy had an alarm set to the police radio that only affected him due to his hearing – whatever was in that message triggered the alarm and made him do this. Now we're in here, he's out there but what could he be doing? He's been gone about six hours now and he's still got a tracker on, so we can tell if he's up to no go- huh?_ He was so deep in his musings he didn't notice Starfire until he almost walked into her, jumping back ready before relaxing at her smile and the steaming mug she held forwards,

"Your favourite beverage friend-Robin."

"You're a life-saver Star; I'll explain later," the alien nodded, floating up again as she swigged her own glass of mustard, looking thoughtful,

"Friend-Cyborg," she began, "is it possible for you to use friend-Beast Boy's communicator to see where he has been?"

"Way ahead of you Star, been doing that since this whole mess started but that makes even less sense than everything else. The tracker dumps every fifteen minutes, pinging out its last position even when it's switched off, so we can only get a partial picture rather than a full map but look at this," a scale map of Jump City was suddenly lit up with a small rash of red, time-stamped dots, "notice anything about where our little broccoli-heads' been?"

"All industrial districts, the outskirts of town at first then…?"

"At first but more specific, look at these two hits." The other two Titans did, green and masked eyes both widening as they realised what they were seeing,

"Why would Beast Boy go into slaughterhouses, and it looks like he's been in most of them around Jump?"

"Could friend-Beast Boy be flying over them?"

"That was my first thought Star but no," the screen zoomed in dizzyingly, displaying a 3D model of the building, "the tracker was inside the buildings, at least it was in one case, the other was just above it, going up or down. This is getting weird."

"If only we could hear what was in that broadcast," Robin lamented, gulping his coffee in frustration before a sudden squeal from Starfire nearly made him spray it all over the console,

"Friend-Cyborg, friend-Beast Boy's communicator! I remember you telling me that the communicator records all transcripts of all communications for an entire Earth week!"

Silence rang out around the control room for several seconds until a loud 'booyah' echoed throughout the Tower,

"I'd completely forgotten, you're a genius Star; the files are encrypted though – Rob, I'll need you for that."

"On it," unlike his mentor Robin had at least a modicum of respect for privacy, so the Titan communicators had been designed to encrypt all communications they stored and then dumped to the mainframe in such a manner that required at least one Titan leader and another Titan to open them; the recordings were then erased after a week to prevent the system becoming cluttered. As he inputted his code and let the scanner flick over his hand (for obvious reasons, eye-scanners were useless to him), he was still rattling out orders,

"Play everything from the second the alarm went off and correlate it to the communicator positions, we need to be as close to real-time as possible – Star, you check on Raven and let her know what we've discovered so far; when she's ready we'll all listen together to prevent any repetition. Until we know exactly what'd going on we have to assume worst case and we may need her to contain whatever his goal is."

XXX

"Please tell me you've found Beast Boy; I really, _really_ want to hurt him!"

 _At least she'll be eager for action_ ; despite the humorous thought Robin was nevertheless careful to keep his face blank as he took in the figure that stuttered to a halt in mid-air. Despite her hood being up Raven had wisps of her violet hair stuck to her clammy face, the Azarathean paler than usual and hunched over in mid-air, evidently not trusting herself to straighten out yet,

"Hey Raven," Cyborg greeting, a smirk playing about his lips as he glanced at her midriff, "looking a little flushed there, or maybe just flushed through…" He stopped as the nearby sofa cushions popped in a cloud of down and Ravens' eyes shone like twin searchlights into the depths of his mechanical soul,

"Beast Boy first, you a very close second," she promised grimly, Cyborg swallowing hard and thinking of how to grease his way back into her good books as Robin addressed them,

"Star's got you up to speed Raven? Good, the transcripts have been downloaded and unencrypted, took a while because of all the computer power we're diverting to keep lockdown on – thus far I've not contacted any of the other teams as Beast Boy's not made any moves towards the civilians or the city and we've had no alarms; that will change if the situation does. Until then Cy and I have got plans to lift the lockdown but it won't be quick; Raven what shape are you in?"

"Could I teleport us out you mean?"

"Or break us out if needs be?"

"Only as a last resort," the cambion grimaced, hoping the kettle would soon boil, "my gut feels like it's being hugged by Mammoth and I can't concentrate very well – one spike during my incantations and something we need could blow."

"Including you," Raven's burning gaze could have nailed Robin to the wall behind him but even as Cyborg's shoulders heaved with restrained laughter the Boy Wonder kept his poker face, "right, put that on the back-burner; Cy, play the tapes." Controlling himself, the mechanical teen nodded and hit play, Robin talking as he did,

"First, at two-fourteen, a police radio transmission wakes B up; twelve seconds after this he makes his first transmission from his room…"

There was a crackle, then a brief blurt as the communicator was switched on,

"Pip," even cracking with tiredness and stifling a yawn the voice was unmistakably Beast Boy, sounding somewhere between excited and alarmed, "I repeat, pip." There was silence for a second and Robin drew in the breath to speak again before someone else, a voice he'd never heard before silenced everything else with a single, hard-edged demand,

"Confirm."

None of the Titans heard Beast Boys' affirmative, nor did they hear the communicator cut off; only after a few seconds did the room explode into noise,

"Who in the _hell…_?"

"I did not recognise him…"

"Great, he's using the Titan network as social media…"

"Shut up, everyone," heart pounding at the potential implications of this security breach Robin rounded on the resident mechanical genius, "you never said he got a reply!"

"I didn't know," Cyborg countered, as shocked as the rest of them, "the communicators work off a separate system to the mainframe, they don't interact even after they upload. It's a security feature, stops bad guys hacking our mainframe from stolen ones." Feeling his blood pressure decelerate the Titan leader breathed in, breathed out and then carried on,

"So, whoever that was couldn't speak to anyone else, any other Titan?"

"No, not unless B gave them their individual number; the communicators are networked with each other and only each other. Outsiders can be invited to call a single Titan; I know Argent's local police force have a link to her as she's often solo; but the network blocks them from the others. Long story short our mystery voice can't speak to anyone else but we also can't speak to him unless we get B's disc."

"Damn, so much for that idea," Robin swore softly before looking up, "so, we know Beast Boy has an outside contact – we can't prove they're behind the signal that woke him up but I wouldn't bet against it. Next question, what does pip mean?"

"Are there not many different pips; I have found them within the orange, the apple and the melon so far."

"No, well, not quite Star," Cyborg explained, "those pips do exist but I doubt the walking green-beans' looking for them, least of all where he's been going." Mulling this over, the Tamaranean quickly nodded,

"That makes the sense, so pip is likely a word of codes?"

"Yeah, you're probably right though what it means we don't know. Anyway, after this conversation he leaves the tower, initiating the lockdown at two-eighteen…"

"That's fast," Raven chipped in, explaining herself at a few odd looks, "have you ever seen him first thing?" Starfire nodded,

"Like a _morphlark_ after _yorgonhof_."

"True, he's usually last up after all of us - still, after leaving the Tower he heads towards the mainland and Jumps' outskirts," Cyborg narrated, the map before him lighting up to track the errant Titan's journey, "and here things really go nuts. He visits six properties, all involved in storing or processing meat-related products – this time-stamp indicates he's going inside. Just outside one of these we get the largest download, I assume a conversation going off what we know now. Here we go."

All present, even Raven, now hugging a hot water bottle to her aching stomach, craned in to listen at the familiar click, their team mates' voice echoing forwards a second later,

"Chip, I repeat chip," once more his voice somewhere between dread and determined, something not echoed by the answer from Beast Boys' unknown benefactor,

"We're eighteen hours out…"

"Too long, it's started," Beast Boy overrode the stranger, "give me Apex." There was silence for a long few seconds before the other voice came back, perhaps a hint of concern where before only business had had a place,

"Beast Boy you know your Apex…"  
"That was a long time ago."

"True, but it is still a risk..."

"Damn it Steve you know what's going to happen" the cold venom in the changelings' voice was enough to make the other Titans fall back a pace – none of them had ever heard the green teen swear or speak so frigidly before, "it's a risk to my friends; they're locked in our tower for now but that won't stop them. Give me the damned Apex."

"You know what it could do to you afterwards?"

"I'll take the risk; worst come to worst put me down when you get here and publicly disown me. I'll have this tracker on, now give me what I need to do deal with this!" Again, a fractional pause before the voice came back,

"Very well, standby; _here kome die sonne…_ "

As the transcript devolved into what sounded like gibberish Cyborg increased the volume fractionally, straining to put the words into order,

"What is that?"

"A mix of languages, but they're all nonsense," Robin decided, getting confirmation from Raven a second later as the half-demon nodded, "there's German, French and I think some Mandarin."

"Punjab and Japanese as well but even together they don't make any sense," the dark titan confirmed, "it's not a spell either, it must be a code…"

"Or a trigger," the hair on Robin's neck stood up and he suddenly shot a look towards the steel surrounding them, "Apex, think about it – Beast Boy's part animal, all those killer instincts. What if these words…"

"Unlock them," Raven suddenly seemed shrunken within her cloak, shock on her face as she imagined what her annoying team mate could be capable of if fully unleashed, "you think someone could have somehow, what, psychologically separated them in his youth?"

"And now they're back," Robin moaned, imagining the potential carnage, "it's the Beast all over again, this time without the Boy to control it! We have to get out there and find…"

"Enough!" The sudden bellow shocked all of them enough to see Starfire, arms folded and hair flying about her in a wild tangle as her ire stoked it, regarding them severely, "You will not deplore friend-Beast Boy on just your suspicions – you have done so before friend-Robin and were proven very wrong! I do not know what an Apex is but I do know that friend-Beast Boy asked for it from this person and I do not believe he would do anything to threaten the innocent of Jump City."

"And he was looking out for us," Cyborg backed the alien princess up, replying part of the conversation, "he locked us in here to protect us, at least in his own mind, though he thought we'd break out. And apart from all that if he was out of control the alarm would have been howling hours ago; this conversation happened at three-forty-two in the morning, that'd've been four hours to kill by now." In the face of such impassioned defence and solid logic Robin's pessimism was forced to yield, the crime fighter holding up a hand as he relented,

"You're right, both of you; I over-reacted but it is the only thing that makes sense based on what we know – whatever was said must have had an impact on him."

"It had one on you," Cyborg muttered before raising his voice, "now listen up, there was one more call made at three-fifty-seven from the Jump City outskirts, here," a red spot on the map lit up, "it's short and his last one." Once more the ping of contact was made and their friends' voice echoed through, now purged of its former emotions and somehow hitting all the harder for it, a pick made of ice as it struck into them all,

"Suited up, moving out; arrive at the Tower and tell the other Titans, they need to know."

"Understood… good luck, Garfield."

"Out."

Again there was silence, all four Titans swapping glances as the meaning behind the short sentences sank in until,

"Garfield?"

"Is that friend-Beast Boy's name?" Starfire asked tentatively, still not sure of this human custom of false names,

"Yeah, must be," Cyborg said bewildered before a gnawing sense of shame crept up on him, "I never knew, never even asked."

"None of us did and because of that we've got no idea who Steve is or how Beast Boy knows him," furious with himself at his lack of basic knowledge; seriously, during their innumerable pizza parties, training sessions or gaming marathons had none of them asked Beast Boy about his origins, not even once; Robin choked down his choler to focus on the problem at hand, "and we can't get answers sat around here – we've got to get out, find BB and work out what's going on with him! Raven…"

 _"_ You'll be the first to know."

"Right, and I have to crack the release code; plug me in," Robin did so, plunging the wires that extended from Cyborgs' chest cavity into a secondary charging point as the android began to exert more processing power on the problem at hand, "it's eleven digits long, I can do… more if I shut off the cannon; worst-case fourteen hours and change."

"It's just coming up eight now so we can get going at ten-ish at the latest, maybe more if you need to charge. Star and I will track Beast Boy via his communicator and keep you both posted; right, it's magic verses science, a race to open the door first," despite the grim situation Robin couldn't quite hold a smile as the mage and the machine both glared at him, "titans go!"

XXX

The only saving grace to the entire day was that nothing else went wrong.

An alarm going off would have truly put the cherry atop this macabre cake of misery; with Cyborg a silent sentinel and Raven a cramping ball of misery curled up on the settee and scowling as failed to levitate simple objects, the Titans were like aggravated tigers pacing in a cage. Nothing held their attention, no programmes or conversations distracted them from their inner thoughts and turmoil – conversation was short and stilted (non-existent in Cyborgs' case) as the same questions, mocking and drenched in disbelief, rolled around their minds;

 _Who is Steve and how he relate to does Beast Boy? Is it from before he was a Titan?_

 _Did I never ask where he came from, who his parents are?_

 _Is Apex related to his powers, and how did he get his powers anyway?_

 _His name is Garfield – how could I not have known that?_

The sense of not knowing worried at them all, coupled with the sense of belated shame that, obliquely at least, what was going on here was if not caused then at least exacerbated by their ignorance – because none of them had asked (or, as Robin pointed out, pressed for answers to) very basic questions they had no idea what their team mate was doing or why. Overlooked by the silent Cyborg, Robin quickly isolated several instances where he had approached the younger teen only to find his questions gently rebuffed, coming to an unpalatable conclusion as the two female Titans reported the same,

"He knew what he was doing," the acrobat admitted leadenly, explaining as both regarded him nonplussed, "whenever any of us asked he deflected it either with his own questions or by goofing up at something."

"And even before we asked," Raven chipped in, adjusting her hot water bottle, "he made us feel uncomfortable for doing so – empath," she explained dully as the attention shifted to her, "I could sense he wasn't comfortable talking about his past and you must have realised that as well subconsciously."

"Was he faking it; I mean, could you tell?"

"No and not perfectly; I'd guess there are things that he'd not want to talk about but at least some of it was an act."

"Including his foolishness," Starfire added, brushing her hands from where she'd hoovered up the last of the sundered glass from the window, "doing what he has done illustrates cunning that would be celebrated by a Tamaranean war-leader." Raven favoured her with a deadpan expression,

"Cunning – by trapping his own war-party and poisoning one of his team-mates?" Starfire nodded,

"If one did not wish to be followed and could deceive one's war-brethren so easily, what else could it be called?"

"On Earth it'd just be called deceit Star, though having said that…" Robin stood from where he'd been glowering in his favourite armchair, drawing a pen-light from his utility belt, "…Raven open your mouth."

"Excuse me?"

"A joke tea bag shouldn't have you out for this long, they're not that strong," he explained, clicking the light on, "if Starfire's right about his cunning he must have seasoned it with something; open up." Eyes slightly narrowed but trusting her leader Raven presented her tongue, moderately embarrassed as Robin shone the torch into her open mouth,

"Can't see anything," he said a few seconds later as he straightened up, "wait here you two, I'm taking it to the lab."

"Boil another kettle while you're there, my water bottle's going cold."

Fortunately for Raven's peace of mind (there was only so long anyone could endure Starfire cooing over her disgusting pet, least of all her when the cramps were stopping her meditating) they didn't have to wait long for the diagnosis to come back, though Robin appeared perplexed as he placed the bagged-up bag in front of them,

"Well it has been tampered with; the IR scanner picked up traces of silver dust within the bag itself – you're not allergic to precious metals are you Rae?"

"Raven," she corrected him, the name reminding her of her missing team mate with a strangely uncomfortable jolt; without him the tower was just too quiet, "and not in the way you think. How pure was the silver?"

"Absolutely." Raven nodded, her suspicions confirmed,

"Silver that refined is also called true silver; it's a reagent in a lot of alchemical rituals but, unless used specifically, it interferes with the regular flows of magic." Robin's eyes widened,

"So, when you made your tea…?"

"Beast Boy had me imbibe the alchemical equivalent of Ex-Lax," the dark teen groused, gritting her teeth as her aura flickered briefly before collapsing, "the more I try to channel the more the silver interferes, hence the pain. It's not enough to seriously affect me but it means I can't cast – much as I don't want to I have to chalk up a point in favour of Starfires' cunning theory."

"But how would friend-Beast Boy know about magic?"

"I'm beginning to think Beast Boy knows a lot more than we gave him credit for Star," Robin said seriously, adding a new and frankly quite frightening piece to the puzzle he couldn't even half complete in his mind yet, "how much we're going to find out." Buoyed by her teammates' determination Starfire levitated, Silkie wriggling in her grip as she squeezed him softly,

"You are correct friend-Robin; we will find friend-Beast Boy, make him explain his actions and discover why he did not trust us with his past as we have trusted him with ours," fortunately the Tamaranean was too caught up with renewing her determination to notice the flash of guilt across the faces of the two Titan birds, "all we must have is faith in our friends. It is too late for the breaking of the fast now, I shall try this brr-unch meal you told me of friend-Robin, could you help me prepare it?"

Despite Starfire's enthusiasm, however, the day wore on in agonising slowness, exacerbated by the lack of daylight due to the lockdown shutters remaining stuck. With such stifling confines and only able to see roughly where their errant team mate had travelled by his communicator, the first they knew of their liberation was a rasping cough and hum of servos from their formerly-silent companion,

"Heh, sorry y'all," Cyborg rumbled, coughing as his systems came online and he realised how thirsty he was, "thirteen forty-seven, not bad but could have been quicker – whoa!" Still disengaging from his former communion with the stubborn system he was unable to intercept the squealing orange comet that smashed into chest but, though it creaked ominously, his armour held against the Tamaranean's enthusiasm,

"Friend-Cyborg," her happiness was so potent the android felt himself rise, "you have done it!"

"Yeah," he managed, "Star, air!"

"Eek! Apologies friend!" His feet returned to the floor with a gratifying clang and he heaved down sweet oxygen, shaking his head at the princess's stricken expression,

"I'm okay Star," he assured her, ruffling her hair in a manner he swore made her purr; _though from what Rob told me her species descended from cats so it might happen_ ; "just need a drink and we'll get going. Rae, how you holding up?"

"I'd hate to feel worse," she groused, coming to her feet and grateful the cramps had finally begun to recede somewhat, "though that little goblin will once I get hold of him; I'll teach him to poison me!" Cyborg froze halfway through the glass of water Robin had passed him,

"What; B, poison you? He'd never…"

"We'll explain in the car," finally unleashed after a whole day away from the action Robin was desperate to solve this mystery but, he reminded himself, doing so meant covering all the angles, "Raven, you still can't use your magic?"

"Not fully but it'll do."

"Right, in that case," he screwed up his courage, "I want you to wait at the Tower; whoever Steve is Beast Boy told him to come here nearly seventeen hours ago when he was eighteen hours out. We may not find Beast Boy in that time so someone should be here to get answers when he arrives."

"And if he's not friendly?" Cyborg put in, folding his massive arms as he highlighted a flaw in the Boy Wonders' reasoning, "Rae's tough but we don't know this dude, and he could be bringing muscle for all we know."

"True but if we leave all the defences online Raven can co-ordinate them long enough for us to return, certainly long enough for you Star," the princess nodded; if a friend was in danger distance was no obstacle, "hopefully we'll be able to talk Beast Boy out of whatever he's doing and get back here before that deadline but it's probably safer for you in here than out there and you know it Raven." She did, no matter how much that truth hurt she knew it was still the truth; without her magic she was virtually helpless and none of them had any idea how long it would take (or if it was possible) to bring Beast Boy to heel. Still, she had a reputation to maintain,

"Fine, just make sure you bring that walking insult to comedy back here," despite the pain it caused she let her eyes glow red and her teeth turn to fangs, "we'll see how fond he is of toilet humour after a one-way ticket to the local sewage-works, one tiny piece at a time!"

All three of the remaining Titans shared a shiver before bidding their friend farewell, running down to the garage after Cyborg ensured their defences were active and Raven was comfortable manning the controls. Slamming the key in the ignition of his beloved baby, the robotic teen took only a split-second to heed the last position of his missing little brother from Robin before hitting the gas. Rocketing through the opened garage doors the T-car kicked up a plume of water as it shot towards the tunnel to the mainland, Starfire trailing in its wake as the Titans raced into the darkening gloom of Jump City amidst the pouring rain.

XXX 

_The Stalk was ending._

 _Hunter-prey, they were both and neither; seeing nothing but knowing from instinct another hunter-prey was abroad. Hawk-eyes saw nothing but wolf-nose could follow the scent, so heavy even the rain couldn't wash it away while cold-blood and chameleon-skin, slick with water, stymied his rivals' vision. Instincts long honed over millennia guided his steps, not a ripple passing through the puddles he strode over, approaching the rival hunter-preys' eerie with a deceptive tread; like him it would strike at the slightest provocation, knowing it faced if not an equal then at least a challenger. Claws twitched and flexed, the world filtered away through senses demanded from his unique genetic code to protect his territory and Pack. Wolf-nose tracked the scent while mole-fur tasted the travel of the wind, his path changing to stay downwind as bat-ears detected heavy treads, the rival on the move above and before him. Human intelligence, submerged but not drowned as it once had been by the animal kingdom in his head, quickly calculated he was too far for his claws and the stings at his wrist had no real target – he needed to get closer and dare the fire of the hunter-prey – it was stealth against observation, swiftness of eye verses softness of foot. With this in his currently-partially human mind he dared another few steps through the shadows until a series of steps, loud as church bells to his enhanced senses, made him stop dead._

 _He knew what the other hunter-prey would do; even as he reversed direction he prepared, changing himself to prevent it and nurturing the growing fury and fear, the most powerful forces to the beasts in his soul; the Stalk was ending in the next few heartbeats and he would need them all for the final act._

 _He saw his Pack._

 _He saw red._

XXX 

Not even Robin had realised how difficult it would be to track Beast Boy when he didn't want to be found; only timely uploads from his communicator allowed them to even get a loose fix on his location. Having ordered the Titans in on foot, realising the car might spook their team mate if he truly had gone feral, Robin had used every element of his acrobatic training and observational skill to try and locate the missing changeling in the murk of the large alleyway his last ping had pin-pointed him at a minute or so.

Against whatever had been done to his friend, however, none of the multitudinous hours spent in the gym or crime lab counted for anything.

Their warning, the only warning, was the slightest splash before a blur of darkness swept towards them, cutting an angle away then jinking back at a speed Robin had never seen outside of the Flash family. His reactions were a month too slow, fingertips barely brushing his belt as it leapt; he blinked, not wanted to see his own death as the gangrel thing swept down on him like the reapers' scythe. Starfires' scream rang in his ears, a loud 'whoa' from Cyborg just behind him as he felt a breath of displaced air – realising what had happened he span around in time to catch a wrecking ball in the gut. The impact smashed the air from his lungs, hurling him towards the alley wall as his vision fractured with tears of pain; only from the clattering noise did he realise Cyborg was in trouble. _Move_ ; he demanded of his body, redoubling the effort to force his leaden limbs to react as he saw a flash of strange-coloured light and heard a series of explosions just ahead of him, a Tamaranean expletive blackening the air as he forced himself to a knee and dashed the water from his eyes only to freeze at the sight before him.

Even in his short life Robin had seen more than his share of terrors; the aftermath of the Joker's rampages, his friends tortured and at the mercy of a madman in a half-coloured mask, Alfred Pennyworth's white gloves finding a smudge of dust in his room at Wayne manor; but what stopped him dead in his tracks in that alley on that night was not fear, nor some form of psychic attack by the gaunt figure stood atop the prone Cyborg – it was recognition juxtaposed with surreality. Rationally he knew it was Beast Boy, it had to be, but emotionally he couldn't believe Beast Boy would attack his friends, would hammer the triggers on a pair of pistols; _since when has he ever used guns?!_ ; would look at him with that too wide smile and eyes glazed with the lust for blood…

…but Beast Boy, or whatever Beast Boy was now, did all those things and Dick Grayson feared for his life.

XXX

 _The hunter-prey had targeted his Pack._

 _He demanded weapons and had them; fire shot from his stings and his body rippled, flesh writhing like a living thing as he shifted. The air was alive with fear and smoke, the beasts within rising in a stampede; he had a heartbeat before he was swept along but not away, with them – with that heartbeat he warned his Pack away from the other hunter-prey and what was now inevitable._

 _The Stalk had ended._

 _The Kill remained._

XXX

He was not the Beast; the Beast would have been kinder than the twisted thing before them.

Later, after time dulled the shock and instinctual revulsion, Robin would remember at least six separate species making up the twisted amalgam that leapt off a thrashing Cyborg to face them. The smoking guns it had emptied down the alleyway span into the wrists of the gauntlets and disappeared as his face split horizontally, another horror appearing as his throat and cheeks exploded with muscle, his last words glottal as a shaking finger speared over their shoulders,

"Get to the Tower!"

With that the creature disappeared, rushing into the alley with a wild, ululating roar as Robin felt his feet leave the ground as though detached from his body, his mind still fixated on the drooling, fang-filled grin of the anamorph. He kicked reflexively, doing nothing but hurting his foot as Cyborg bellowed,

"Out; Star get down and outta here! To the car, run back there – Rob get a grip!" The name, his name shocked him back to awareness and he was moving with the half-android rather than against him. Logic suspended in favour of survival instinct none of the teens did anything but run until they'd covered the quarter-mile to where they'd parked the T-car – as soon as they arrived both boys were smothered in a hug as Starfire broke down into tears,

"Friends I," she began, choking, "I am so glad we… we are…"

"Star what…?" Shaking his vision clear of red hair Robin forced himself back a little only to raise an eyebrow as he realised Cyborg hadn't, in fact the eldest Titan was leaning on the Tamaranean, sweat streaming from the human side of his face as he breathed raggedly. Recognising he was in the dark about something the former apprentice of the Batman said nothing until the two disengaged, his voice calm and measured as he spoke,

"What did I miss?" For a second he feared he'd get no answer as the two shared a glance before, shaking, Cyborg wiped his clammy brow and spoke,

"B just saved my life."

"How; I didn't see much after he kicked me."

"He tackled me, knocked me at least five feet and put me on my back. He took us both out the way of the shot, I only saw it impact but it must have come from the end of the alley, the top of the buildings there."

"A sniper? Did you see who?"

"It must have been friend-Robin but I did not see anyone on the roof," Starfire explained, flight slightly restored as gratitude for their survival began to banish the shock of nearly seeing her friend killed in front of her, "my eyes were on friend… friend-Beast Boy, though I could barely believe that was our friend. I only saw the bolt just before it hit where friend-Cyborg had been stood, that was why I," she looked away ashamed, "I was frozen friends, I did not know what to do." She settled to the floor again, tears misting her eyes as she cursed her weakness and what it might have led to before another voice reached her ears,

"Starfire, Star; Koriand'r look at me," Robin demanded gently, placing a hand on her shoulder and squeezing softly as he felt her shake, "it happens, we had no idea what was going on and Beast Boy alone was enough to shock us all. I've never seen him look like that, not even as the Beast; still, this proves he was trying to protect us with the lockdown," grasping at the meagre positives Robin managed to dredge up a smile, "he must have known he was up against a Deadshot wannabe and we'd be sitting ducks – say what you like about our regular peanut gallery but most of them couldn't hit the sea if they were stood on the shore."

As he'd hoped the lame joke made the Tamaranean chuckle slightly before her face became more serious and she looked over his shoulder, fist clenched as she held herself back from returning the way she'd come,

"But this new _clorbag valblernelk_ can and against him friend-Beast Boy is alone."

"That might be for the best," both Robin and Starfire looked over at the croak of a voice, seeing Cyborg half-collapsed against his beloved car as the shock at how close he'd come to the end lapped against his mental fortitude, "whatever's going on we can't help him, we need to do what he says. We just got in the way against whoever that was and, and one of us nearly got killed because of it."

"That shot would have, done it?" Recognising his leaders' attempt at delicacy Cyborg nodded gravely,

"I scanned the hole it left, that's why I got you out of there so damned fast – he's packing some kind of plasma weapon." Robin's jaw dropped, his skin turning ashen as he met Cyborgs' eye and recognised the seriousness there; _titanium or not plasma would go straight through!_ ;

"Yeah, my thoughts exactly," the half-robot admitted, reading his leaders' face, "if B hadn't been there it would have cored me like an apple."

"But how; not even WayneTech or LexCorp have plasma as a stable power supply, let alone a man-portable weapon. Star can any people you know use plasma like that?" The alien thought hard,

"On Tamaran we do not but it is used in the ships of other races, and possibly in weapons mounted on those ships. As humans use arms of fire, however, not to my knowledge."

"I'll contact the Justice League, they need to know," Robin decided, marching forwards with purpose as he held out a hand for the T-car keys, "ride shotgun Cy, you're in no state to drive; Star in the back, no need to give whoever's out there an easy target. You're right Vic, much as I hate to admit it; we have to trust BB on this, we're going back to the Tower."

Neither argued and for that the Boy Wonder was grateful, though it was a sombre ride back across Jump City and Robin was careful to alter speeds and drive defensively, hopefully making the T-car a hard target against the lurking shooter. Tuned into the police network he was at least grateful to hear no reports about recent gunshots; _less likely for them to scramble and get mixed up against this new madman_ ; though as a new voice suddenly crackled to life his shot nerves almost resulted in the T-car spinning off the road,

"Robin," unaware of the heart-stopping effect of her interruption Raven made her report in her usual monotone, "a ship has just parked over the Tower and wants permission to land."

"Is," Robin wheezed as he tried to recollect his shattered calm, "is it Steve?"

"I didn't ask."

"Patch me through directly but listen in."

"Hold on," there was a brief delay and muted buzz before the transmission reconnected and Robin made his introductions, "this is Robin of the Jump City Teen Titans, to whom am I speaking?"

"Mento, commander of the Doom Patrol."

Robin's knuckles whitened on the wheel; he knew little enough of that superhero outfit but what little he knew was not good news; _and Beast Boy knows him, better than I do if he's comfortable using Dayton's real name_ ;

"I see," he replied, granting himself a few seconds to think, "we overheard Beast Boy's transmissions – I didn't recognise your voice Mento."

"And I don't recognise yours Robin; if you're outside get back here, this is Doom Patrol business." Gritting his teeth at the dismissal the Boy Wonder quickly held up a hand to silence the growing anger on his teammates' faces,

"Jump City is under our protection, but," he added just before the radio frosted over from Mentos' remote ire, "I recall Beast Boy telling you to explain things to us – you'll stick to that?"

"Much as I don't want I don't have a lot of choice; Batman trained you well – he was always sticking his cowl where it wasn't wanted," the older man grudgingly admitted, "return to your Tower and tell that insufferable girl on reception to open the doors before I knock them down. Out."

The car was silent for a moment before a verdant glow shone from the backseats, Starfire like most of her people not fond of those who would insult her friends,

"Mento is seeming to be a _clorbag_ of the highest order." Cyborg snorted,

"You're not wrong Star; who's that asshat Rob?"

"Steve Dayton, aka Mento, commander of the Doom Patrol," he answered shortly, nodding as he saw understanding dawn on the larger teens' face, "I knew Beast Boy had history in a superhero team but I never suspected the Patrol."

"Never heard of them; who are they?"

"According to Batman, and I quote, 'a bunch of lunatics, and Mento's the worst of them'; they'll do whatever it takes to get the job done including sacrificing members of the team."

"Really?"

"The really?"

"Really," Robin confirmed before raising his voice, "Raven, you still there?"

"Would I be anywhere else?"

"Disengage the perimeter and let them into the main common room, they will make good on his threat otherwise. How're you feeling?"

"Mento's still in this dimension isn't he?" Despite himself and the grimness of the night the team leader chortled,

"Good as all that eh? Hang tough, we're on our way."

"I'd rather hang Mento, or Beast Boy come to that; where is the green idiot anyway?" The atmosphere within the car cooled considerably at the question, Cyborg regarding the transmitter with disdain; before harsh words could be spoken, however, Robin stepped in to pour oil over troubled water,

"Still out, hopefully the Patrol can tell us why; just don't antagonise them until we're there."

"I make no promises – Raven out".

There was silence within the car for a few seconds before Starfire leaned over the head rest of the front seat,

"Do the stepping on of the gas friend-Robin," she said softly, looking across the water at the distant tower worriedly, "I do not feel comfortable with the Patrol of Doom being in our home or around friend-Raven."

"No need to tell me twice Star," the masked teen was already moving up the gears, "I want my team together and I want answers; like it or not Mento is going to give me at least the latter."

"Yeah," Cyborg cut in, looking out the window over the darkened city, "the rest is up to Beast Boy."

"Is there nothing we can do?" Star's voice was subdued but, knowing even the scraps of what they'd seen, the metallic teen couldn't come up with anything more than a faith he seldom acknowledged,

"If you've got a god start praying," he intoned, a humourless chuckle escaping despite himself, "if you haven't pick one fast."

As soft Tamaranean chanting filled the T-car and Cyborg's organic eye closed, Robin despite himself mouthed a short plea to anything that might have been listening to watch over and protect their friend as they, the Teen Titans, had been unable to.

XXX

Not fifteen minutes later the Titans found themselves as a quartet facing down the same number of strangers in their living room; as Starfire flew over to check Raven, who had been facing the Doom Patrol down solo up until their arrival, was well Robin drew himself up to speak only to find himself beaten to the punch by another member of the Patrol,

"Where's Garfield?" The woman he recognised as Elasti-girl from both Batmans' files and Alfred's well-stocked collection of classic videos ( _An Elegant Scandal_ was amongst the old butlers' favourites, though Rita Farr had been a relative unknown at the time and thus only played a minor role as a handmaiden) stepped forwards and took a quick head-count before addressing him directly, "We thought he was with you."

"You thought wrong," Cyborg answered, folding his arms with undisguised dislike at the interlopers, "he's still out there." Elasti-girl reeled as though physically punched,

"Alone? He's again…" Her face whitened, a dreadful realisation rushing over her like a tsunami of liquid nitrogen as she rounded on her team leader, "Steve you _didn't?!_ "

"I had no choice; he'd have gone anyway," abrasive he might have been but as his furious wife suddenly loomed over him none could deny Mento at least had courage, "he has pack mentality Rita, you know that. With Apex he has a chance to survive."

"Survive against what?" Robin felt his temper fraying, "What the hell is going on in our city, what's the Doom Patrol got to do with it, what is this Apex and how is Beast Boy involved?" Still staring down his wife Mento spared the younger hero a scathing glance,

"That is not…"

"Right, right that's enough all of you," another voice made itself, the automaton known as Robotman taking a pace forwards and shoving the feuding couple apart, "we're not here to start a fight and I'm hoping we won't have to finish one either. Now everyone breathe and we'll go from the top, okay?"

After a few seconds of silence Robotman carried on, glancing at his team mates as he made belated introductions,

"Right you all know Mento; the scary woman next to him is Elasti-girl or Rita, I'm Robotman or Cliff and the walking bandage over there is Negative Man."

"Robin, Starfire, Raven and Cyborg," Robin replied as abruptly as he could without appearing rude, "and I assume we all know Beast Boy."

"You assume correctly; what's he told you?"

"About the Doom Patrol; nothing," the confession of ignorance was bitter, Robin not quite able to meet the androids' electronic gaze, "he never said anything about his past."

"And you never asked or went looking?" Mento butted in, regarding the teenager with an expression somewhere between affront and dismissal, "Batman knew."

"Batman knows everything; it makes him unpopular," Raven pointed out, not concealing her distaste for the helmeted man as she hovered slightly higher than his eye-level, letting her look down on him as the worst of the true silver had been naturally purged from her system during her watch, "we realised he didn't want to talk about his past and didn't press him – it's what friends do."

"Friends, not commanders," Mento pointed out before shrugging, "still, your team is your own affair. Beast Boy left us after inter-team disagreement…"

"Bullshit," Rita snarled, Robin idly wondering how long Mento would be spending on the couch following this debacle, "you kicked him out because he put us over the mission even after Apex nearly broke him! I told you he was too young but you…"

"What the hell is Apex?" Cyborg suddenly roared, patience expended as he slammed his fist down on the counter, "My little buddy's out there fighting some psychopath with a weapon that shouldn't exist and I'm only here now because he pushed me out the way of it! I don't care what happened between you and the green bean I just want answers – now start talking or so help me I'll beat them out of you!"

"And I will be giving friend-Cyborg the hand," Starfire's eyes were literally blazing; prayers to X'Hal were mostly battle-psalms and the painful reminder that her friend was fighting without her had shortened her usually even temper, "you will tell us what we need to know; friend-Beast Boy asked you to do so and you will not betray his trust."

The Tamaranean's words seemed to echo for a moment before somehow taking the wind out of the other team, the Doom Patrol flagging at the reminder before Robotman let out a grating noise as he cleared his throat,

"He did and we're not going to; we'll tell you what you need to know but that requires a bit of a history lesson. Gather round kids, class is in session – Robin what do you know about us, the Doom Patrol?" The Titan leader shrugged,

"Not a lot and even less that's complementary."

"Good, that's how it's supposed to be," Robotman admitted, noting the surprise on some of the younger faces as he went on, "the Doom Patrol wasn't originally a superhero team; it was started by the military back in the late seventies, early eighties – we came along later after people in high places and the science community started making discoveries and putting pieces together. As soon as they had evidence about what they were looking at they founded the Patrol, first using soldiers, then meta-humans as they became available. We're the current incarnation but there's historically been… turnover."

"Your reputation precedes you," Robin commented dryly, "I take it the original Patrol wasn't formed to take out supervillains?" Robotman shook his head with an audible squeak,

"That came later, first as cover then more of our day-to-day as the Brotherhood of Evil took shape. Still our original goal is our most important, protecting humanity against; please don't take offence Princess; but against an alien threat."

"Aliens?" Cyborg parroted before recalling some of the wilder theories he'd heard around the schoolyard, "Like, Roswell and Area 51?"

"Partly but not quite," Mento took over the story, "the discovery was mostly archaeological, scientists exploring why so many ancient cultures built similar structures – turns out that wasn't an accident. Later contact with the species, specifically eye-witness accounts from survivors of their attacks, indicate they're aggressive, highly advanced and using Earth as some sort of intergalactic stop-over, though why and exactly for how long has yet to be determined. In response to this threat the Doom Patrol was formed to deal with them as they arrived on our planet."

"Arrived, as in invasions?" Mento laughed, a brief, ugly sound,

"If they invaded wholesale we'd be wiped out in a week – we don't know exactly what they're doing or why but they…" He was cut off but a sudden chime from the Titan mainframe; before he was consciously aware of it Cyborg had it playing through his in-built speakers,

"Beast Boy calling the Tower, come in."

Relief swamped everyone, even Mento letting out a deep sigh at the words as Starfire, almost beside herself with excitement, rushed to the console and began gabbling at top speed,

"Friend-Beast Boy it is good to hear your voice X'Hal has answered my prayers are you harmed or in need of the pizza or burgers of tofu…"

"Whoa Star, breathe," Cyborg demanded, hauling her bodily away from the microphone and asserting himself, "where are you B?"

"Are the Doom Patrol there?"

"We're here son," Rita called, an elongated smile on her face and tears dotting her cheeks, though to her credit her voice held steady, "where do you need us?"

"Hip terminated, I repeat…"

" _What?!_ You ki…," Mento exploded, disbelief etched in his stony façade before he turned and bellowed at Cyborg, "…track any and all air movement or explosions a hundred miles from this city, now!"

"I can't; city terms," the robotic teen defended himself as the psychic looked furious, "we can't scan further than the city limits, more than that we might breach state borders."

"Bastard bureaucrats," the veteran hero swore before forcing himself calm, "Garfield are you injured, did it explode?"

"Yes; it never got the chance."

"Do you have a body?"

"No." Mento closed his eyes and nodded, for once looking less business-like as he spoke again,

"As expected; can you get back to the Tower alone?"

"Yes."

"Apex?"

"…Manageable."

"Then come home, leave your communicator on," a ghost of a smile flitted over his lips, a hint of softness in his voice as he spoke again, "good work son."

"Beast Boy out."

As the transmission ended and a red dot appeared on the Jump City map the tension evaporated, grudges between Titans and Patrol disappearing as though they'd never existed. Refreshments were offered and accepted, the eight superheroes conversing more freely but always with one eye on the projected line slowly advancing towards the tower, picking its way slowly though the deserted streets,

"So, you are not friend-Beast Boys' _k'norfka_?"

"Not biologically; Steve and I adopted him after we were married," Elasti-girl assuaged the younger girls' curiosity at the same time as wondering how she could stomach so much mustard, "his early life wasn't the best Starfire, more than that you'll have to ask him."

"I shall friend-Elasti-girl," the Tamaranean promised, suddenly looking downcast, "I have been a most terrible friend to your _bumgorf_ ; I know so little of his past, yet he has never once not listened to my stories of Tamaran." There was a ghostly chuckle from nearby, the bandaged from of Negative Man giving the younger girl his approximation of a smile,

"He's good at that, just give him time."

"Or ask him when he comes in," Cliff chipped in before suddenly straightening, a sudden reminder flashing across his still-biological brain, "actually everyone, or all Titans I should say, listen up – you need to know about Apex."

"Mento was just describing it," Robin answered, glancing up from where he'd been in conversation with the Patrol leader, "it's some kind of hyper-strict training regimen the Patrol goes through?"

"Not exactly," Mento filled in, raising his voice when he registered interest from the other Titans, "though like you Titans we're designed to work as a team, when the Patrol first began recruiting meta-humans it quickly became apparent that there were likely going to be times when operatives would be alone against deadly enemies, especially if engaging our extra-terrestrial targets. To counter this our original leader developed the Apex protocols; I hate the Chief for personal reasons but this I can't fault him on, it's saved all of us here at least once before now."

"And Beast Boy has it, a reason for your earlier spat," Raven pointed out, perhaps a hint of concern colouring her usually monotone as she faced the veteran directly, "what does it do?"

There was an uncomfortable silence, the Doom Patrol swapping glances with each other for a few heartbeats before Robotman took the lead, his already-gravelly tone grave, solemn and hitting all the harder for it,

"It's a combination of hypnotherapy, psychic tweaking and other types of mental influence tailored for each individual that undergoes it; as you can imagine Mento carries it out now. It's designed to unlock, if you like, the full potential of an individuals' abilities, be they baseline human or meta, triggered by a code-phrase originally; you heard Beast Boys' from what Cyborg was telling me. However the ultimate aim is that over time, years or even decades, the Apex integrates into normal behaviour and the host becomes able to control it almost at will, or it engages automatically at times of high stress; we all, myself, Rita and Larry, can do so. For normal humans it makes them capable of near-superhuman feats such as ripping off car doors, staying awake for days on end or completely ignoring pain – for metas it depends on their existing powers."

"So it basically, what, supercharges you, or anyone who has it?"

"In a way yes," Robotman agreed with his younger counterpart, "for instance I become a complete killbot while Negative Man gets the power of a nuclear reactor and his spirit becomes strong enough to kill with a graze if it has to."

"Interesting," and to her credit Raven did at least sound interested as she regarded the mental manipulator of the Doom Patrol directly, "so what did Beast Boy gain when you sang that song to him?"

"Almost complete mastery of his genetic code," Steve replied coolly, trying to ignore his wife drilling into his temple with a steely glare, "he normally morphs one animal; under Apex he can become a complete chimera as I believe you saw earlier. It lets him cherry-pick the deadliest tools in nature as he needs them, though as you can imagine setting this up in his mind and then releasing it had side-effects…"

"Which damn near drove him mad Steve," from the fiery frost in Rita's voice it was obvious this was still a sore point between the couple, "I said he was too young."

"And I said it needed to be done; he had the potential, no forget that he _is_ the best of us. Look," he waved a hand towards the screen, Beast Boy making his slow way back to the tower and approaching the Jump City bay, "a hip terminated, alone, that proves it – no-one in the Patrol's history can boast what Garfield has done!"

"Hard to boast when you forget how to be human," Elasti-girl shot back acidly, "or did you wipe your mind of those nights of him screaming as he rattled his cage?"

"Whoa, whoa, what?" Cyborg had heard enough, staring them both down with his mechanical eye glowing threateningly, "What happened to the grass stain?" Elasti-girl met his gaze squarely for a second then looked down in shame,

"I didn't know what Steve had done; I'd never have agreed and I still don't; but after Garfields' Apex was implanted we went on a routine training mission, the African wetlands. While there Steve triggered it, thinking Garfield would react better in an environment he recognised," her eyes were stone and not even Mento could meet them as the scorn in her voice raked him, "he was wrong. Garfield was overwhelmed, couldn't control it properly; he ran into the wilderness and we lost him – it took us a month to track him down and even then he didn't recognise us, he had too many conflicting instincts and animal desires, he couldn't focus. We had to contain him and we only just managed it; if we hadn't been able to we'd have needed the final sanction."

"Final sanction," Robin parroted, bile swirling in his belly as his face went white, "it was, he was that much of a threat?" Robotman nodded gravely,

"Negative Man didn't always need bandages kid, and I wasn't always a machine."

A stunned, cold silence pervaded the room only to be banished by a ringing clang as enlarged flesh met metal had very high speed,

"Oww! Damn it woman there's not much of my mortal coil left" Robotman demanded, holding both hands to the side of his now-ringing skull, "leave my brain alone!"

"Start using it and I might," Elasti-girl retorted before regarding the Titans again, "ignore the mobile paperweight; as far as we knew or anyone could prove Garfield never hurt a single person while he was lost, least of all us. After we found him again he went through months of therapy," Mento got another nasty look at this point, "and managed to recover, though he doesn't remember much about that time."

"He remembered enough to become a vegetarian though," Negative Man put in, his shrouded face shifting from one Titan to another, "he's not eaten meat since; well, not unless the Apex was triggered again." A nearby toaster exploded, Ravens' eyes splitting into four as rose on a column of shadow,

"Again," her voice was laden with doom as her crimson gaze fixed upon Mento, "you put him through more pain?" To his credit the older hero met the cambion's ire squarely, flinching only a little before her otherworldly show of force,

"What was done couldn't be undone; Garfield had his Apex and had to learn to control it – to send him on his way without that would have been compounding my earlier actions, though I still say it was for the best and tonight has proven it. I was hard on him, I had to be; I don't think of him as the potential best of us simply because of what his Apex lets him do, I've believed that since I first saw him train and I sought to hone what was there into what the world needs."

"And damn what Beast Boy thought about it all," Robin had heard this before far too often – the greater good, it seemed, had more adherents than just the protector of Gotham, "you wanted a perfect soldier!"

"No; I'm a soldier, we all are," Mento cut back, indicated the arrayed Doom Patrol around him, "but the world needs more than just grunts – against what's out there it needs something else, a superhero unlike anything we've seen before. Garfield's my son and always will be but I'm not prepared to damn the Earth to save even my own kin; I forged him in the hottest flame I could muster and now he's cut cleaner than any other Doomer ever has. This morning he asked me for his Apex to save you," the mind manipulator reminded them, his voice hard as flint as he stared down the demoness, "and because of the training he'd gone through, the work he'd done and his actions after leaving us I trusted him enough to control it – if I didn't it would have stayed locked in his mind, he'd have gone out before we could arrive to back him up and Rita and I would likely be mourning him now. You don't get to the judge me Robin, or you Raven, and Rita you already know I hate myself," even Mento's iron will had a limit and he sagged, massaging his forehead as his last words left in a sigh, "I regret what I've done every time I see, hear or even remember my son, but I will not apologise for it."

Into the silence that followed came nothing; what could be done? No longer hampered by the true silver brew Raven could have banished the Doom Patrol commander to any number of hells but it would have been meaningless – what greater punishment was there above seeing the apple of ones' eye and being reminded only of your pain and failure? Mento had turned away rubbing his eyes and Rita was regarding the floor, lips moving in a soundless grumble as the Titans shared looks, unable to form a judgement. Only when Negative Man stepped forwards and cleared his throat did they break off from silent introspection,

"Look we can argue semantics or ask what we'd have done until the end of time but I've got a better idea; let's ask the guy all these decisions and the Apex actually affected huh? He's nearly here anyway," there was the merest sliver of sea between Beast Boy's position and Titan Island, the changeling obviously in an aquatic form, "make sure the doors are open and give him space."

"That's not an idle warning kids," Rita broke off from her introspection to regard the Titans squarely, "you heard Garfield earlier on his communicator; under Apex he's not his usual self. When he arrives hold off, you especially Star," the older hero favoured the princess with a kindly smile, "I'll want to hug him to death as well but until we know how deep into the animal kingdom he is we'd all better play it safe." Despite her concern for her friend the Tamaranean found herself echoing the sentiment,

"I understand friend-Elasti-girl – I will wait until friend-Beast Boy has recovered to the full before expressing both my great joy at his survival and undertaking the kicking of his butt for making us worry!"

XXX

Despite her promise to her friends' adoptive _k'norfka_ , however, when the door main entrance to the tower common room slid open and the light from within illuminated the shattered figure in the doorway it was all the Tamaranean could do to keep her feet on the ground, hands clasped to her mouth at the sight as Raven turned away, almost retching as the emotional revulsion and concern from all seven other heroes hit her empathic senses like twin hammers.

Whatever Beast Boy had faced had not gone quietly; the teen looked like he'd gone ten rounds with Cinderblock. His uniform was in ribbons and the skin beneath it was just as bad, redness soaking half his face as it looked like his right ear had been slashed off, though at least the bleeding had stopped. His hunched posture and slouching speed suggested broken ribs but worse still was his right arm, held protectively across his chest; even through the strange gauntlet he was wearing all could see it was deformed, at least one of the bones broken. For a moment everyone; Beast Boy, Doom Patrol and Teen Titans; were rooted to the spot, then with an animalistic growl and bared fangs the returning superhero took another step forward, pupils reflecting the light of the kitchen above him as he moved inexorably towards the fridge, apparently unaware of his audience as they began to recover,

"He," Cyborg swallowed his rising gorge, "he got back here, like that?"

"The Apex," Robotman reminded him leadenly, "he can't feel pain."

"What the hell did you do to him?"

"What was necessary; careful," Mento snapped as Robin whirled to face him, reaching for his belt, "no sudden movements, he might react badly."

"You call that necessary?" Robin demanded, not sure whether to laugh or swear but Mento remained unmoved,

"Most people facing what he did die; he's alive so yes, it was."

Robins' retort to this was cut off by a terrible tearing noise; Beast Boy had made it to the fridge but couldn't easily open it with his left arm alone, so said arm had expanded with muscle and torn the door clean off. Negative Man sprang to the side as his former team mate hurled the useless sheet aside and all present saw hunger explode across the changelings' face just before it too altered, the jaws lengthening obscenely, the cheek muscles bulging as he ripped something out the fridge and crushed his new fangs around it. The meal, chicken leftovers Cyborg had been intending to boil for stock, splintered in his teeth, the snapping of bone making most look away as Beast Boy swallowed without chewing, throat expanding like a python as he forced the meat down. It was an orgy of consumption, the shapeshifter not caring what he ate as long as it was once alive, ripping open packaging with his teeth to gorge on the succulence within. Tatters of plastic and unsatisfactory offerings mounted at his feet, his stomach distending unnervingly even as at last the pace of his eating slowed; with a last few chews and swallows Beast Boy stepped backwards, eyes closed as a tongue unlike any in nature wiped around his distended lips; he breathed once, twice, jaw returning to correct proportions like a balloon deflating as he opened his eyes again, this time looking at his shocked audience and, after a heart-stopping moment, inclining his head,

"Evening."

No-one answered at first as they took in the sight; now he faced them head-on they could see the damage was strewn further throughout his body, though mercifully it appeared his enemy hadn't connected with his plasma weapon. Still, even for veteran heroes the teenager was a beaten, bloody sight, flaking scabs and scraps of uniformed intermingled with a bizarre neon paint splashed across his hands, belly and what was left of his uniform trousers. He seemed to pay it no mind, instead waiting for an answer and only reacting when Negative Man touched Raven's shoulder, stilling her step forwards,

"I can heal those wounds," the sorceress stated, so shocked at the state of her team mate that all previous crimes of the day were forgotten. The bandaged man made to answer her but to universal surprise Beast Boy beat him to it,

"I already am," his voice was a growl and his eyes hooded, twitching from face to face ferally despite his capacity for speech. Noting this Raven didn't back away but also didn't approach further, instead steeling herself to look more closely at one of his various slashes for signs of regeneration,

"How?"

"Reptile, starfish, salamander, take your pick," he grunted, patting his belly, "needed fuel."

"I ah," Cyborg chuckled weakly, "I always wanted you to come to the meat side grass stain, not like this though." Despite his formidable arms and armour Cyborg quailed as fangs were bared at him – only when he heard the snuffling huffs did he realise the changeling was laughing,

"Eat a tofu burger tomorrow and we're even Tin-man," he managed with a crooked smile before his luminous gaze fell on the figure next to him, "Robotman."

"Now kid?" At the anamorphs' nod Cliff sighed as much as his robot body would allow him to, "Fair enough; ditch the other glove though, just in case," after eyeing his adoptive uncle Beast Boy bit into the sleeve of his left gauntlet and slowly eased it off, taking care not to jostle his broken arm. Finally able to see the unusual hand wear up close Robin examined it from a distance, subtly navigating his way around Robotmans' bulk to get a decent view; _there's the gun butt, held around the wrist for a quick spin and release, though the gun itself must be custom-made as it's so thin. Apart from that and those metal bands around the knuckles it doesn't look that special though – good luck B_ ; hearing a soft growl as the robotic hero gently took the fractured limb in his powerful hands the Boy Wonder realised what was about to happen and braced himself,

"Wait," he also wasn't the only one, Raven taking another step forwards and locking eyes with the changeling directly, "you don't have to…"

"You feel pain from your healing, right now I don't." His logic was sound, though that didn't stop Raven feeling uncomfortably useless as she heard Cliff speak again,

"Break feels clean but this might hurt even you; ready?"

"Do it."

To his credit Cliff didn't hesitate, quickly but carefully moving the ends of the sundered bone together and not flinching even as the Titans jumped backwards at Beast's Boy's reaction to what should have been agony. Even as his expression barely twitched a trio of foot-long blades shot from the knuckles of his pinned arm, the hidden weapons of his gauntlet triggering as reflexively as a cat extending its claws from the pain. Honed to a razors' edge they flashed menacingly, stained by the green paint as Cliff held his adoptive nephews' arm until slowly he mastered himself enough to sheathe his claws, blowing out a breath as he stepped back and slowly flexed his right fist,

"Should be fine now," he muttered half to himself before addressing the others, "let me sleep it off. Steve, lock up the Apex when I'm under." Mento nodded, knowing from experience that his son had not fully integrated his true potential even after his success but proud at how far he'd come. Business done as far as he was concerned Beast Boy made to retreat to his lair before a final question made him pause,

"Garfield," it was Robin, his team leader and alpha, "what was it?"

"What?"

"We heard you talking to Steve earlier, about the lockdown," the crime fighter admitted, the other Titans nodding as the changeling cocked his head, "you tried to protect us, hell you saved Cyborgs' life out there. What were you protecting us against?"

He saw it an instant before the change happened; it was an infinitesimal twitch of the lips, even smaller than a Raven smile but it was there, proof that regardless of his other changes Beast Boy had the heart of a prankster as he closed his eyes and his shift engaged. His broken arm remained in place despite the new physiology surrounding it, his unstable genome filling in gaps and placing flesh where there should be no flesh on any creature from Earth. He grew and changed, DNA absorbed from his recent kill the template as in an instant a new being stood where Garfield had been, its alien anatomy twitching in mirth as the others in the room all lurched back appalled at his new appearance and, for one of them, the sudden familiarity of his new skin.

XXX

The Doom Patrol were right.

The Apex was right.

God damn it perhaps even _Mento_ was right!

Against this abomination there was no lower level – any weapon, any course of action could be justified to rid the world of such a creature. Even as his instinctive revulsion conspired with his fight or flight response to root him to the spot however, Robin's analytical brain was peeling past the awful skin to the deeper issues beneath, looking past the inhuman to the even more troubling behaviours though before he could question too deeply all ears within the room suddenly rang with a long, loud scream. Multi-compartmentalised lungs used to store oxygen during voyages into space were emptied, Starfire reeling until her back hit the far windows, normally flushed orange skin bleached and eyes wide with abject dread, her emotion-based powers fled as she babbled in high-pitched Tamaranean, not ceasing even as the change was reversed and Beast Boy stood before them again, perhaps a hint of apology in his tone as he nodded at the stricken alien,

"Not pretty; it's dead now Star, the others are gone, no need to worry."

With that said Beast Boy disappeared towards his room, Mento following at a more discreet distance and shadowed by Raven, the sorceress not entirely trusting the older man with if not the life, then certainly the mind of her team mate. All others were clustered around Starfire as the Tamaranean shook, tears filing her eyes even as Rita's enlarged arm gently pushed the others aside and she drew the alien royal into a gentle hug,

"It's alright Koriand'r," if anyone was curious as to how Rita knew the princess's real name they didn't ask as her trembling began to abate; for a long moment the two females were united until at last Starfire managed a step backwards, still pale but upright as Negative Man spoke,

"Tamaran has history with these creatures are well?"

"So I believe," she managed, looking to her friends as her face became graver, "there are many stories and folk songs sung of the _j'hyrai_ ; they are like the human man of bogies, ghosts that wound or kill many of our heroes. The example is the saga of F'ynord the Belligerent, though only the latter seventeen verses are commonly told as a side of bed story for young _bumgorfs_."

" _J'hyrai_ ," Elasti-girl repeated, her experience in memorising lines letting her copy the alien dialect easily, "is that their Tamaranean name?"

"It is closer to a title than a name," Starfire admitted, screwing up her face as though trying to spit something unpleasant out before shaking her head, "there is no direct translation into the English, but a close approximation would be 'the-alloter-of-death-who-takes-heads'."

Uneasy glances were shared at this title, though from the state they'd seen Beast Boy in it seemed a fair name, a fact cemented by a series of squeaks as Robotman nodded,

"That tallies with what we know; every member of their race we've recorded has been a predator – we believe they're using Earth as some kind of game preserve, a giant hunting ground."

"Hunting what – us?" Cyborg felt his skin tighten, memories of his near-death experience flooding his mind as all three Doom Patrollers looked grave,

"They've been known to Earth for thousands of years, teaching our ancient civilisations simultaneously, perhaps by accident – the Egyptian pyramids, the temples of the Aztecs, they're all built from the same template," Rita explained, "they were first recorded in the late seventies when one of them attacked an elite combat unit in the Southern American jungles – it left two survivors, including my grandmother. She was one of the early voices for the Doom Patrol and helped oversee its early days, giving us most of what we know of these things; Cliff's right, they are hunters but they only hunt what they see as worthy sport – creatures that pose a threat to them."

"Beast Boy was more than that though, he killed one of them," Cyborg pointed out, proud of his little brother despite his normal aversion to killing, a sentiment Rita echoed as she nodded,

"He did, and more importantly he did so without letting the damned thing blow up; according to our records these things have some sort of honour code we don't understand. They take trophies from worthy kills and their society seems entirely based around the better hunter you are the higher you rank, some kind of species-wide dick-measuring contest. Problem is, if they're beaten by their prey they turn into space-samurai and detonate themselves to avoid the shame – Garfield must have stopped that happening, probably why it tore him up so badly."

"He either had to kill it outright or disable its explosives, and plasma would give one hell of a bang," Robin suddenly realised, his skin cold as he pictured the aftermath of such a detonation. Seeing his face Negative Man nodded,

"It would have left a smoking crater the size of this island; kid's a big damned hero but it's what he's been trained for, we all have. It's the reason we've got our reputation and why we fight crime like we do."

"These things only hunt worthy prey, the most dangerous individuals on this planet," Rita went on, standing tall and shutting off the part of her that now feared for the future of her child, "the purpose of the Doom Patrol was to draw them onto us; they'd be attracted to stalk us and from there we could take them down, they've never hunted as more than individuals to our knowledge."

"It's also why the kid locked you in here," Cliff added, proud of his adopted nephew, "these things have hunted bad guys as well as good; we've got eye-witness accounts that one of them wiped out the drug cartels of L.A. in the late eighties single-handed – they were heavily armed and it wanted a challenge. Here though, you were its most likely prey and Gar knew it – he kept you out of the way and called us in because he knew you'd stand no chance; you didn't know what you were dealing with."

There were a few seconds of silence before Starfire, eyes downcast and fists flexing, stood to her full height and made a quiet but solemn declaration,

"The morning of tomorrow I will do the recital of X'Hal's exertions of bravery to friend-Beast Boy, all two-hundred and eight verses" suddenly she looked up, her eyes glowing a furious green as her teeth gritted in rage, "then I shall do the throttling of him for not telling us of this! If the Patrol of Doom has known of these creatures why have they not told the League of Justice or others – these _clorbags_ must be stopped before more blood is shed!" Negative Man sighed,

"The League knows, some of them at least but think about it princess; you're an alien too, just like Superman, the Manhunter and most of the Lantern Corps. These hunters have been stalking humanity for centuries, well before our first documented extra-terrestrial superhero, hell they helped shape our ancient culture! If the knowledge they're still hunting here became widespread how long do you think it'd be before the pitchfork-and-torch rent-a-mobs were crawling out their holes demanding someone ' _do something!_ ' about the alien threat – we'd be serving up the Super-clan to Luthor on a plate."

"He's right," Robin knew and had experienced enough human psychology, twisted or otherwise, to recognise a likely outcome when he heard it, "it'd be a political nightmare, the registration programme all over again and this time with really sharp teeth. The League though, do they help you guys out because the Titans will if you need it."

All three of the Doom Patrol looked shocked at that admission, swapping glances before with a smile Rita stepped forwards, placing her hand on Robins' shoulder as she looked through his mask to the eyes beyond,

"I heard you'd left Gotham to get out from Batman's shadow – if that's true you've succeeded Robin; thanks for the offer but no, not against the predators at least, though if you could keep the Brotherhood and other idiots off our backs we'd be grateful. The less people in the crossfire the less chance we have of word getting out, though Mento fears and I agree that with the recent growth of metahumans we're effectively giving them a more attractive hunting ground."

"Like ringing the dinner bell in a tiger cage; fresh heads here, come and get them," Cyborg grunted, mechanical mind already racing into ideas for stopping these things based on the little he knew; _plus what B's prepared to tell me once he recovers from his knocks_ ; "it's going to get worse isn't it?"

"Most likely yes," Rita agreed, not even her enhanced physique able to stop her shoulders slumping at the admission, "our one saving grace is that most of the time they're discreet; they come, they kill, they leave; and they only hunt things dangerous to them. If you're unarmed, or appear unarmed, are a child, old or pregnant you're likely safe, so they ignore most of us outright. We know they're intelligent but no-one in the Doom Patrol has ever spoken with one; tonight was the first confirmed hunt we've had since Mento and I joined the team, most of the time we arrive too late or it's a false alarm."

"Confirmed?" Robin repeated, thinking back to earlier in the day, "Pip and Chip?"

"Potential and confirmed hunt-in-progress, quick code-words we can use across any kind of media," Robotman translated before looking up, "look, it's nearly midnight and I know Mento's going to want us gone as soon as he's barricaded the Apex back up and we've said goodbye to the kid, we were onto a promising lead in the Middle East before Gar called us. Get some sleep, I'm going up to prep the jet."

"He's right, it's been a rough day for all of you," Rita agreed, regarding each of the Titans fondly, "you've got my word nothing will happen while we're here; Mento knows better than to mess with me." The robotic titan snorted, eyeing the slightly shorter woman appraisingly,

"That I do believe; okay guys, I can watch over the Tower electronically even when I'm powered down. Er, before you go though," the eldest Titan quickly hustled off as the others swapped confused glances that only became sharper as he reappeared a minute later, one hand behind his back as he sidled up to them sheepishly, "sorry to impose and I'm sure you get this everywhere but… could I get an autograph – it's my favourite."

Looking down at the brightly-coloured case held out towards her Rita quirked an eyebrow as the other two Titans present tried hastily to stifle giggles; already embarrassed, Cyborg felt a bead of sweat roll down the side of his face as she looked up at him before letting out a loud breath of relief as she smiled,

"I like this one as well – most of the time I can't stand to see things I starred in but there's an old-world charm to _An Elegant Scandal_ that always gets me."

"Me too, and I never really studied history," Cyborg admitted, all but vibrating in excitement as he watched the thick sharpie pen trace over the inside front cover of the DVD case, "this just really hit a chord with me for some reason; thanks."

"Anything for a fan and I know you've all been good to Garfield, even Raven," a shadow flickered over her face at the name but she banished it with scarcely an effort, "he's fond of her."

"He's fond of all of us and vice-versa," Robin admitted, though he couldn't quite stop a slightly guilty grin as he was forced to admit, "regardless of how bad his jokes get sometimes." Rita snickered,

"If Mento couldn't break that habit you've got no chance; now get some sleep, you never know when you'll need it and we can sleep on the flight. Please though," for a moment her face was troubled, her hidden concerns coming to the fore for the briefest instant, "just be patient with him for a little while – the Apex, and everything else…"

She didn't finish, she didn't get the chance as this time she was held up by one she had previously comforted, her arms wrapping around Starfires' slim shoulders as the Tamaranean spoke,

"Whatever friend-Beast Boy needs he will have from us, however long it may take." Rita stiffened at this knowledge, then relaxed in the princess's compassionate embrace,

"Thanks Starfire," the woman murmured, the weight on her mind lessened, "I'm glad he found you all after us; we trained him to be a soldier, a hunter and if necessary a killer," tears trickled from the corner of her eyes but she forced her grief back so her gratitude could flow free, "but it was you Titans who made him a hero."

XXX

The next morning those words still echoed throughout the four minds around the kitchen table, Raven having been filled in on what she'd missed as she'd observed Mento's skilful manipulation of his adopted son's dreaming mind. She hadn't spoken a word to the abrasive man even as he'd left the room, instead hovering in the doorway and continuing to gaze down on her comatose team mate as the other members of the Doom Patrol had come in and said quiet farewells, watching in morbid fascination as his ear slowly regrew and his cuts shrank. Only at Starfire's gentle insistence had she made her way to her room, foregoing her normal mediation in favour of falling asleep as she heard the faint roar of the Doom Patrol jets' engines lifting off from the tower roof.

With the interlopers in her home gone the gothic Titan had found sleep quickly, waking early in the morning to a deserted kitchen, quickly emptying the now-useless fridge and tidying away the reminder of Beast Boy's excesses the previous night without complaint. A swift teleportation allowed her to restock and return just as Cyborg made his way into the kitchen, his slow smile and thumbs-up encapsulating her mood better than words could have managed. Soon the kitchen was alive with sizzles, the scent of grilling food seeming to summon Starfire and Robin from their rooms; apart from the Boy Wonder quickly calling to place an order for a new fridge, however, there was little conversation; much like the previous day the Titans were waiting for answers, though this time without the sense of time slipping through their fingers and a friend being in danger. The atmosphere was expectant but relaxed, so much so that when the last of their team finally appeared still towelling off his damp hair and wincing as he avoided his tender regrown ear even Starfire was able to contain her excitement to only a minor eruption. The four regarded the one and he them, time seemingly frozen between them until, at last, the smallest of them all managed a weak smile and raised a hand,

"Heh, sorry for… well, everything." No-one answered, at least not with words; instead Cyborg shut off the grill and stepped in front of him, looking down at the green teen with a solemn expression,

"You saved my life last night." At the uncomfortable reminder Beast Boy squirmed,

"Yeah, about that…"

"Don't," the older boy cut him off, sinking to a knee to put his hand on the changelings' shoulder before drawing him into a brotherly embrace, "the Patrol told us you were good at that, too good for any of us to spot it even Rob. You saved me and probably the rest of us from that alien, you deserve all the credit, the last slice of pizza and that disgusting slop contaminating my grill – you are still vegetarian right?" Arms around Cyborgs' bull-like neck Beast boy nodded,

"Yeah, I only get a taste for meat when I Apex out, though just to set the record straight he wasn't aiming to kill you. Their guns have targeters, you can't miss them if you know what to look for," he explained, realising he was likely going to be doing a lot of this for the next few hours before he could have his curiosity assuaged, "he was going for your leg."

"But, why?"

"To flush me out," Beast Boy shrugged, holding up a hand as Cyborg looked suddenly mortified, "he knew I was stalking him but couldn't see me, shooting at you made me reveal myself. Luckily I had guns of my own – according to Patrol records they'll sometimes abandon their gear to have a fair fight but I don't trust that enough to go without my firearms against them."

"They're from the Doom Patrol right?"

"Yeah, useful having a multi-billionaire as an adoptive father," the changeling chuckled weakly, "those gloves are the edge I need, took them with me and buried them on the outskirts of Jump when I left the Patrol just in case I needed them later."

"And we all so very grateful you did friend-Beast Boy," since Cyborg had opened the floodgates there was no way Starfire was going to miss out on a hug, though hers was tight enough to constitute a warning as well as a reassurance, "though I am the furious that you did not tell us of your history with another team. You will rectify this now or by the eight-six aspects of sacred X'Hal I will be pulling a Raven and throwing you out to the sea!" The anamorph laughed, pulling out a table with his arm before wincing,

"Ah, still a bit tender – don't panic," he assured the rest of his now-interested team, "it'll be fine by this evening. Anyway I know the Patrol filled you all in; Rita told me last night and under Apex I'm aware of noise even when asleep," he answered the question he could see brewing on Raven's face; _which reminds me I'd better set that record straight sooner rather than later_ ; "you know about the predators, or whatever it was you called them Star?"

"Not enough but out of respect for the Patrol and their mission we're not going to pry too deeply or spread it around – Mento said the League knows, though what they're doing about it is another story," Robin admitted, not happy at being caught unaware by a creature as formidable as the intergalactic hunter, "I just want to hear your side of it, there's some things about yesterday only you could tell us."

"Like what? There's no point me being dishonest," the changeling pointed out, sighing as he reached for a knife and fork, "ask what you need to Rob, and the rest of you – as long as it's not classified by the Patrol I'll answer." Robin nodded but before he could say anything another voice cut in, Raven regarding her more annoying team mate levelly from across the table,

"Two words," the mage intoned solemnly, "true silver."

The whole table winced, Beast Boy worst of all as he smiled sheepishly at the same time as gauged the distance to the nearest open window in case he needed to make a break for it,

"Ah, sorry about that mama," he apologised, realising he still had possession of all his limbs and deciding that was a good thing, "old Doom Patrol trick against magic users and short of beating you into that healing-trance thing you do I didn't have anything else to hand."

"You still have some?"

"Only a pinch or two, Steve's the one made of money not me; I never used it on losers like Mumbo because they're not worth it."

"And I am?" An amused smirk played over Raven's lips as his jaw dropped, "I suppose I should be flattered by that. Very well, I won't be scattering your component atoms across the infinite hells today Garfield, but," she leant forwards, eyes glowing white, "you owe me a new box of tea bags and for your sake they better be good ones."

"Only top of the range for you Rae," Garfield promised, chuckling lightly as she settled back down, "give me a knock when you and Star head to the mall again, you can point out your favourites. Any other favours I owe while I'm here?"

"Apart from my stomach lining – I swear if I get an ulcer from this I'm naming it after you," Robin told his younger friend, not quite able to keep a straight face as put his thoughts in a logical order, "let's go from the top; your dog-whistle alarm?"

"Called city hall for a multi-band emergency service frequency scanner, they gave it to me no questions asked when I said it was Titan business – I rigged it up to continually monitor all radio transmissions from emergency services across Jump. The alarm triggers to certain words often used in the clean-up of predator attacks; mutilated, ritualistic, hanging, skinning – general not-nice things; form there I can review and listen in on the whole transmission, flying out if necessary to get a look myself."

"And this time?" Beast Boy looked uncomfortable,

"The call said all the right things, that's why I called Mento so soon; after that I hit the lockdown and flew out, got to the scene about twelve minutes after the call. It was bad; looked like a drug or arms deal was going down when the pred crashed the party; seven dead, bodies everywhere but most importantly some of them had been hung and skinned, they do that for prey they don't want permanent trophies from but respect enough to honour in death." Wishing he'd not yet started his breakfast Robin wrestled down the rising nausea and carried on,

"And after that, the slaughterhouses?"

"They need to feed but they don't eat people, they seem to like beef; you'd probably get on well with them Cy, the whole 'rip your head off for my personal glory' thing aside. I left the crime scene and went to the local slaughterhouses looking for evidence; smelt it as soon as I got into the right one even in the cold, they've got a distinctive musk. Found the tusk marks soon after and called it in after highlighting the carcasses were contaminated; after that and my Apex was triggered I flew out to get my gloves and went hunting."

There was a brief pause before Robin folded his hands in front of him, measuring his words carefully before the expert on this strange and deadly threat,

"So, in the future we should be on the lookout for seemingly ritualistic killings, especially if heads are taken?"

"Double-especially if people are left alive in the slaughter, specifically people who were unarmed, pregnant or had another possible reason to not be considered good sport," Beast Boy added, knowing Robin and the others were taking in his every word, "if you get anything like that call the Patrol and lie low, don't show off your superpowers and potentially attract the predator onto you, chances are you'll end up a head shorter – sorry, poor taste?"

"The worst, even that tofu gunk's better…"

"Hope so for your sake; I heard you last night," as Cyborg's face fell Beast Boy couldn't help but laugh, "meat for me is tofu for you, that soybean goodness is calling."

"Dude," the larger teen whined before sobering up, "so apart from try not to get spotted by these things what else can you tell us about them?"

He'd know this would be coming and spend a few extra minutes this morning rehearsing a short spiel regarding the capabilities of these outsiders; now, in the face of his friends' expectations, he

"They're bigger, faster and stronger than humans but not a patch on our resident radiant alien, who's also much better looking," despite herself Starfire blushed, "they're tech's better than anything on Earth by a long way, that's what makes them really dangerous. If one's about chances are you'll only see if it wants you to and that's a bad thing; you've interested it. They've some sort of personal cloaking device that bends most radiation around them, including visible light, so most of the time they're invisible even in broad daylight. They mostly see infra-red though they can use other spectrums so if you think you're being hunted the best thing you can do is literally chill out or heat up, it might not see you; last night I was cold-blooded, hence why it had to shoot at you to draw me out. Apart from that and the plasma gun, which for this one was shoulder-mounted by the way, they're experts in a lot of different weapons like spears, nets and wrist blades but they've historically used some sort of thrown disc which can cut through nearly anything. The most important bit is here though," he grabbed his left forearm, "it's a control panel, you need to break that completely to stop them triggering their self-destruct if you beat them."

"Simple as that huh?"

"Something like that, though before anything else happens I need a favour."

"Anything you need just ask B, you've earned that."

"Thanks but I don't need anything from the Titans directly," he told Robin, an embarrassed smile on his face as he looked at another seated figure paying his rapt attention, "it's from you Star." The Tamaranean smiled beatifically,

"As friend-Robin said, ask anything you have need of." The changeling smiled, glanced around to put the moment off for a split-second longer and then bit the bullet,

"Kiss me."

As all jaws dropped around the table and several plates cracked in two Beast Boy slapped his palm against his forehead and not for the first time cursed his big mouth,

"Not like that; well, I didn't mean it like that – I need… you learn languages via lip-lock right?"

"The transfer of knowledge yes but yo… no," remembering what the Doom Patrol had said the previous night Starfire suddenly realised what he was angling for, "please friend-Beast Boy do not ask this of me!"

"If I had any kind of choice I wouldn't Star, believe me, but I don't think I do," his face was grave as he reached for his belt, his communicator resting on the table between then, "at the end, after I killed the predator, others appeared around me and his body. Don't panic," he was just quick enough to stem the riot, his calm assertions quelling the rising panic and preventing Robin from going into hyperventilation, "there's precedent for it; the L.A. predator had the same thing happen; he was killed by a DEA operative and his kin came for the body. These ones did the same, all as ugly as the one I gutted, and they gave me this," he pulled something for the rear waistband of his uniform and set it on the table where a bar scanner immediately swept over it,

"Six-shot Colt revolver, can't tell the exact era but I'm guessing wild west," Cyborg stated, "why would they give this to you?"

"A trophy for my win, probably one taken ages ago by the hunter I killed – we know they live a long time; there would have been no glory in trying to kill me as I was, wounded and not much sport," Beast Boy explained, closing his eyes for a second and recalling the terror, strong enough to overwhelm even his Apex-gifted aggression, that had coursed through him as he was suddenly surrounded by the clade of killers, "this was for my honour. They left, took the body and cloaked, don't know where they are now but they're not hunting, the streets would be red if they were. What I didn't realise, and luckily they didn't either, was that I was about to call you all when they appeared so my communicator was on – they were talking to each other, I'm sure they were, but I need a translator to work out what they were saying, listen." He pressed the play button on the small disc and immediately a series of low growls and clicks were heard along with heavy stomps and rushes of movement; this went on for about a minute before there was a sharp clack of moving metal against flesh, then a voice, strange, otherworldly and terrifying for it, echoed throughout the silent kitchen,

"It yours."

There was more clicking and shuffling, getting fainter all the time, then eventually silence through the communicator as Cyborg, licking dry lips, looked across at the friend he was finding it hard to recognise following his run-in with the formerly-unknown,

"B was that one of them? _"_

"They don't speak exactly, they mimic, like birds with crabs for faces," clicking the communicator off Garfield faced Starfire again, "I'm so sorry Starfire." The Tamaranean said nothing, closing her eyes and standing to her full height as she drew in a deep breath,

"I made a promise to friend-Rita to help you friend-Garfield," she looked at the changeling directly, determination etched in her gaze, "I am a princess of the royal house of Tamaran; I do not break my promises and I do not let down my friends."

"Thank you Star."

"Everyone out," Robin said suddenly, standing up and leaning over to half-pull a suddenly ill-looking Raven out of her seat, "this is private; shout when you're done." Cyborg looked like he was about to argue but fortunately fell into line at Robins' approximation of the Bat-glare, leading him and the Azarathean out of the kitchen just as Robin heard the slithering noise he'd come to associate with Beast Boys' shape-changing. Gritting his teeth the detective carried on, not looking over his shoulder for fear of his willpower breaking as, behind them, Starfire looked into the face of one of her planets' myths of death and, beating down her instinctive revulsion, prepared to complete her promised, heroic duty.

XXX 

"I really wish I'd skipped breakfast," Cyborg complained, rubbing his stomach, "even the thought…"

"Don't," Raven demanded sharply, rubbing her fingertips on her temples, "I'm dealing with the emotions as well as the thought from both of them."

"Both?" The cambion knifed her leader with a sidelong glare,

"You think Beast Boy is happy making Starfire kiss him in that form?"

"Probably not," Cyborg agreed before grinning despite himself, "just like someone not a million miles from here's upset she's kissing him at all; those plates didn't crack themselves Rae-Rae." She tried to glare through his teasing tone, wishing for the ground beneath his feet to split open and send him straight to her fathers' realm but it didn't happen and she was left to look away with a huff, not able to meet the knowing looks of her male team mates as she adjusted her hood,

"Don't tell him," she muttered lowly before rounding on Robin, "you either."

"My lips are sealed; that was the wrong metaphor," the Boy Wonder shuddered at the reminder, "does it even have lips, do those spiky bits count?"

"Lalalalala," Cyborg demanded, sticking his fingers in his ears, "I'm not listening 'cause I don't wanna think about it!" he didn't either, so much so it was only at a harsh impact to his shin that he unblocked his ears as he saw Raven looking up at him,

"It's over, their emotions have changed."

"What to?"

"Confusion mostly, though with Beast Boy that's usually a given," there was no bite in the sorceress's words, the insult completely toothless considering what he knew now, "come on, let's hear what those things said."

 _From this evidence I'd guess nothing good_ ; despite her natural stoicism Raven still had to contend with a spike of both fear and a hint of jealously at the sight awaiting them in the kitchen. Beast Boy, mercifully back to his normal appearance, was stoically resisting the gargantuan force of a Tamaranean hug as Starfire's face was buried into his shoulder, her body heaving with sobs and no noticing as the rest of her team filtered in. The gothic teen said nothing, leaving the heartfelt words she was so clumsy with to the others and bracing herself for the worst as Robin gingerly placed a hand on the Tamaraneans' shoulder,

"Star, Star come on now," he cajoled gently, "I'm sorry if it's bad news but we need to know what you've found out." Relaxing slightly, Starfire slowly stood up a fraction, letting the changeling breathe again; _is that… it is!_ ; for a split-second Raven was confused at her friends' expression, then as understanding settled in she clenched her fists, having to fight to hold Rage back as Starfire drew in a deep breath, recent laughter mingled with relief to lift her into the air as she wiped mirthful tears from her eyes,

"I am so sorry my friends but it is just, just so glorious!"

"What she means," Beast Boy managed, groaning as he hugged his arms around himself, "oh my ribs are never going to be the same; it's not bad news for now."

"It worked? I mean," Cyborg hastened to explain himself as he pointed at the communicator, "you understood that mess?"

"Yes friend-Cyborg; at first I was saddened by the message but friend-Beast Boy has told me _rekma_ s has been delayed for some years," the alien squealed, overjoyed in a way no human could ever understand as she fluttered to the floor again, "the _j'hyrai_ spoke of friend-Beast Boy as honoured prey but one, we believe it to be the eldest, said he would be prey for blooded hunters when he was of age."

"Apparently eviscerating one of their young-bloods; that what they called the predator I whacked; wasn't enough to go straight to the top of their most-wanted-skull list," the younger hero groused, the hint of a smile revealing his fang as he sighed, "so, looks like you've got to put up with me a few more years; I'm going to have to go back to the Patrol at some stage as I've secured their objective at least on this group, but I can help you guys kick bad guy butt for a while before they start coming after my head, or worse." Cyborg, Raven and Robin all exchanged uneasy glances, not seeing Starfire clap her hands over her mouth and look away as, under the duress of a pair of helplessly pleading looks Raven let out a huff and bit the bullet,

"Some years from now you're likely to be the target of a race of aliens that exist only to hunt – please define worse?" Shuddering at the memory of the previous night for a different reason the changeling looked the mage right in the eye as he inadvertently mimicked her straight-faced tone,

"The ones who wanted to hunt me were female."

Starfire collapsed again, choking out a benediction to X'Hal to bless her friend with many _bumgorfs_ as Robin and Cyborg quickly joined her on the floor. Raven was tougher, though her shoulders pitched and bucked to and she had to bring a hand up to cover her mouth, not able to meet Beast Boys' eyes as he regarded her sardonically. Retaining a modicum of control the sorceress stepped forwards, her hand gently alighting on the smaller teens' shoulder,

"Are you all right? Truthfully?"

"It's not ideal but it could be worse," he sighed, toying with his revolver, the gift of the predators with his free hand as the other covered the back of her own, "I'll let Mento know and we'll have to go from there, likely I'll have to go at sixteen." A sudden sharp pang struck into Ravens' chest, the thought of Beast Boy being far away nowhere near as appealing as it once had been to say nothing of the likely mortal peril he was going to be in if these intergalactic monsters came back. Putting it from her mind as best she could the Azarathean gave a quiet sigh, a hint of softness in her tone as she spoke again,

"That's what, still a few years away for you?"

"Yeah, apart from M&M, Kole and Jericho I'm the youngest Titan; still, once Bird-boy over there recovers," seeing her sprawled leader fighting for breath Raven smirked; _could be a long wait_ ; "we'll have to talk about upping my training, especially with Apex whenever Mento can be roped in to reset it."

"You really need that?" Superimposing the figure from the previous night over the boy before her now was like seeing a wolf in place of a puppy – much as she'd been snide towards his laid-back attitude, over that terrible cold efficiency and dismissal of his injuries she'd take slackness and humanity any day of the week. Glancing up at her with a tired smile Beast Boy nodded,

"Not yet but I will, I and the rest of the Doom Patrol don't have a choice. Star heard it plain as day, soon I'm likely to be hunted by these aliens," he pointed out, gaze falling on the old, scuffed gun in his hand, proof of his prowess and his foes' mortality as he gripped the handle hard with one hand and gave Ravens' fingers a soft squeeze with the other,

"My only chance of survival is to beat them at their own game and become an apex predator, and that road starts today."

XXX

A/N: BBVP: DC Make it happen!

Okay, bit longer than I was intending but at the same time I hope it was a coherent story where all the loose ends were tied up in a believable fashion. As to the challenge that started this fic, my nephew beta-read my submission for Golem XIV's collaboration fiction High Stakes, which I highly recommend as all the writers there are massively talented to throw such different spins on the same question. Anyway, in my submission I indicated that Garfield, while serving in the Doom Patrol, was given the superhero alias Predator rather than Beast Boy – at the age when warfare is cool, my nephew wanted to hear more about Predator and, well, one interesting idea led to another….

If anyone wants to pick up and run with this fic e.g. Beast Boy training, the impact of Apex on the other members of the Doom Patrol or even the Titans (imagine the episodes where Beast Boy and his rag-tag team take on the Brotherhood when he's primed with Apex and armed with his gauntlets, and yes they were loosely based off the other famous comic book Logan but have in-built pistols stored in the wrist area), other encounters with Predators or aliens etc please feel free; until next time, see you around.


	3. Chapter 3 - Whatever It Takes

Whatever It Takes

A/N: Work once more compels me to take a long detour from home and my regular writing machine but, having procured a replacement from the dim, distant past of the computer age (seriously, you could concuss whales with this thing), I'm back in the saddle. Having been given another prompt by my loving younger family members prior to leaving I did a bit of research and came up with this little (if dark, and that's the only warning you're getting) offering – hope you enjoy it and, as before, I'll post the exact challenge details at the bottom of the fic.

Time for a little show and tell...

XXX

Starfire was observant, and this changed everything.

It had seemed a normal night, the usual verbal war over video game results evolving into a different, equally well-known argument. Knowing her suggestions would be shot down due to incompatibility between human and Tamaranean (or at least, seven out of nine Tamaranean) stomachs the exiled princess instead watched friend-Beast Boy leap around like a monkey as he squabbled furiously with his elder brother figure, both avoiding friend-Raven, who was quietly reading a book and growing steadily more annoyed by their antics. Despite herself Starfire smiled; since their rocky introduction she'd come to see the youngest Titan as something of a _wooserloop_ , at least when he wasn't being a _clorbag_ with his pranks. Through practically a _bumgorf_ by human standards friend-Beast Boy was brave and dependable (if not particularly intelligent) while his goofy but gregarious nature often solved arguments as quickly as it caused them – in truth, without him there Starfire would have been far more worried about the dread claw of _rekmas_ tearing apart her new-found family.

Friend-Raven's temper suddenly gave with an almost-audible ping; however just before shadowy limbs reached out for the two annoyances friend-Cyborg said, seemingly in jest, a word Starfire didn't recognise and at that moment didn't care about. She'd been watching his quarrelling partner, transfixed by his reaction; for a split-second his smile cracked, his laugh curdled and worst of all his teasing eyes darkened, reflecting things the Tamaranean felt a sudden, visceral recognition towards. Keenly attuned to emotions Starfire felt a sudden cool sweat erupt on her forehead; whatever the word had been it had depressed even the changelings' normally buoyant mood and that warranted looking into.

Seized by sudden, morbid curiosity the dispossessed royal slowly rose from her seat and edged around the two flailing airborne forms friend-Raven was repeatedly inverting as she remonstrated their juvenile behaviour. Trying to keep her mind blank in case her sudden disquiet tipped off the sorceress's empathic senses, she almost fell from the air in surprise as the one friend she'd forgotten about spoke up,

"Going somewhere Star?" Robin folded his newspaper, a surprised quirk to his mask as he regarded her, "It's nearly dinner."

"I am aware friend-Robin, it is just," Tamaraneans weren't good liars by nature but time on Earth had let her pick up a few tricks, "I must do the checking up on Silkie. His skin is dulling and he is off his food – if the documentaries of television are correct he may be ready to shed his skin again."

"Really - poor little guy," the Boy Wonder commiserated before nodding towards the door, "let us know if you need any help; worst come to worst Beast Boy can talk to him." Even as she internally flinched at the name she smiled and nodded before zipping into the hallway, flying towards her room like an arrow.

Silkie was dozing in his basket and she was content to leave him there; sitting at her cluttered desk she pulled out the lower draw, brushed a few flecks of glitter of the matte black back of the laptop she barely used and pulled it open. As it powered up she closed her eyes and thought back to the living room, lips moving silently as she sought to recall the exact word the booming android had used. She thought she had a grasp on it but spelling wasn't her forte; fortunately after typing in what she thought were the first three or four letters the search engine drop-down bar jumped out at her, offering a link to a definition. Selecting it, she paused just long enough to impress the unusual jumble of letters into her memory before taking a breath and hitting enter.

A split-second later, for Starfire at least, existence stopped moving.

How long she sat staring at the screen unblinking she would never know; only a sudden thump on her door broke her concentration and nearly sent her shooting through the roof, hearts hammering against her multiple stomachs and wracking her with nausea even as she managed to answer,

"Who, ah, who is there?"

"Just me Star," it was Cyborg, "got a surf-turf special with your name on it hot off the bike." Normally the thought of such a feast would have had her drooling, now it just made her gorge rise further and she had to swallow bitter bile before she could reply,

"Place, er, place it in the fridge for me friend-Cyborg, I do not think I will be able to eat tonight." There was a pause before the half-robot answered, all humour scrubbed from his tone and replaced with concern,

"You okay Star; need a hand?"

"Not unless you have more than a single stomach friend," by the grace of X'Hal alone she forced levity into her tone, "Silkie is undergoing the shedding, in here is not a pretty picture." There was a muffled gag from the other side of the door and despite herself Starfire smiled; the last time her adopted _bumgorf_ had undergone a growth spurt both friend-Cyborg and friend-Robin had volunteered to help – pictures of their shell-shocked faces as they'd staggered out of her room afterwards still made friend-Beast Boy laugh now,

"Right," he managed weakly after a moment, "Silkie's ah... okay, I'll let the others know. Call if you need anything."

As his heavy tread receded the smile dropped from Starfire's face and she collapsed into her chair, compelled to read the words before her and shuddering, blood draining from her face as crypts of dank, foul memories she'd long buried broke open at their meaning. Beneath the cold, cruel claws of these mnemonic ghosts she shrivelled, vision fracturing with tears as her powers deserted her, then as she faced the screen again it reflected another face, green eyes of a different shade and a spark, cold but bright, caught light in her mind. Under this frigid fire the shackles of nightmare were melted away, the Tamaranean gasping as though doused with freezing water as realisation hit like a punch from Cinderblock – if what she had seen what felt like years ago was right then...

She slammed the laptop shut so hard it nearly cracked in half, Silkie jolting from his drool-inducing dreams but Starfire didn't notice and right now didn't care; the thought of her little _wooserloop_ knowing that word was horrible enough, but for him to react to it as he did meant things she was unwilling to contemplate; _not without the proof_. With the resolve of a warrior born Starfire compressed everything in her mind; memories, qualms, theories and all; into a small ball and shoved them behind a wall of determination, silent psalms to distant X'Hal on her lips as she closed her eyes, steeling herself for what was to come next.

So long was her mental preparation that she felt ready to hunt for answers only in the quiet hours, a minor boon as none of the others, not even friend-Robin, were likely to be awake; _a blessing, for this is a matter not to be undertaken in the light._ With a breath Starfire stood, her back popping slightly as she stretched up and looked towards her door, the glow of her usually-effervescent eyes dulled by cold concentration. She strode to the exit, confident enough to fly but choosing not to – all her resolve was focussed on preparing to resist any potential attempts to avoid this conversation, even the Face. Swift but silent strides ate the paces to the changelings' lair; without giving herself time to think or doubt herself she keyed in the access code and stepped inside – no matter how much what came next hurt she had to know if her friend, her _wooserloop_ , was like or unlike her. Quietly recanting her rehearsed lines, she carefully picked her way through the comfortable mess of his den and, after a silent imploration for strength, shook her smaller team mate awake. Addled by sleep it was a moment before he recognised her and she let it pass, waiting until just before the severity of her expression made him uncomfortable before sitting on the end of his bed of bunks and beginning to sleep.

Moments later Starfire was only grateful the changeling's animal instincts and human intellect combined had deciphered her words and the meaning behind them; he hadn't tried or been able to argue, bluster or bluff any denial. Now in her arms and choking back sobs, the alien could only mutter soothing words and stroke his back comfortingly, waiting for the storm of his emotions to batter itself spent against the bulwark of her fortitude. _It is not fair – how could such a crime be done to one such as him?_ ; as it had been an evil done to, not by, him – no guilty conscience could have faked lamentation this visceral. The back wall of his room was faintly illuminated, rage making her eyes crackle emerald but for his sake she controlled herself, feeling his shudders finally begin to abate,

"It is all right friend," her words were feathered with benevolence as she rubbed the crown of her head against his cheek, a Tamaranean gesture of close, supportive affection, "you will be well. X'Hal hear me," she vowed, her voice rising as she looked towards the ceiling and felt Beast Boy drop their embrace slightly to look up into the full weight of a warrior-queen's resolve, "you will be well friend-Beast Boy."

She had recited this promise over and over in her head, knowing she'd need it if her worst fears were confirmed; she had also prepared to stand firm against any denials or deflections her grieving friend could have used to damn himself and, as the changeling's widened eyes closed a fraction and the tears flooding from them slackened, she brought them to the front of her mind,

"But," he stuttered haltingly and suddenly she jolted as his warm, slightly fuzzy hand found and squeezed her own, "but what about you Star? What happened to you?"

That, she had not prepared for.

Where grief and guilt had flailed uselessly concern cored through her emotional barriers like a _thoqqua_ worm through _zorka_ berries; almost before she was consciously aware of it her tears were soaking his shoulder. In pants and squeaks Beast Boy fought to keep air inside against her embrace as a calcavade of horrors flooded her mind, the black parade of a shattered taboo made no less awful by her ignorance at the time. She managed to speak, faint snippets of the terrible story escaping as she relived the darkest days of the Citadel; Beast Boy listened, then did so again when she was composed enough to tell the full tale and when it was ended he held her once more as the tears returned. In an outpouring of grim relief rather than stifled suffering Starfire grieved over what she had been forced to do, unbridled sorrow sluicing the mental sludge out from where it had festered for far too long.

When it ended, when the catharsis had finally run its course she was felt both numb and light, almost giggling at the ambivalent sensation until she saw her friend regarding her almost wondrously and remembered what he had done to grant her such release. Before he realised what was happening Beast Boy's face was crimson and his tongue tied as he found himself in his team mates' lap, a lead weight dropping into his stomach as she echoed his earlier question; _and she told me. I, I can't, not match that, not after she was brave enough..._

Moments later stones were being overturned on a second mental field of long-denied guilt and self-hatred until when finally raked over and revealed in all its suppurating hideousness, the first tentative green shoots of recover began to grow under a rain of healing tears.

XXX

Long before Starfire left as morning began to dawn a bond had been forged between them – united by such a deep secret both knew without saying a word that things could never be the same again. Barriers between them were laughable; what would you hide from someone who knew your blackest deeds; and over the following weeks and months their familiarity only strengthened. In battle and training they moved with a new seamlessness and all their normal enemies soon had reason to curse this new, novel understanding; Mad Mod, for instance, was still awaiting rhinoplasty after a Tamaranean-pitched armadillo to the face ended his most recent nostalgia-fuelled crime spree.

Time within the Tower also changed for them both; regardless of the circumstances, they now had a deeper reason than mere friendship to spend time together be it cookery lessons for Star under the animorph's gimlet eye (for all Cyborg would curse his diet Beast Boy was a reasonable chef), shared trips to the mall of shopping to spare Raven the indignity or even movie night, where a fat green kitten often purred contentedly on the princess's lap. More precious, though, were the stolen moments when it was just the two of them; in these quiet pauses with their worst scars already bared the rest of the stories written on their skins and souls naturally followed. In her room playing with Silkie, the training area fooling around on equipment to win daft, made-up races, the trophy hall (or evidence locker, as Robin insisted on calling it) reminiscing about old battles or skipping stones into the ocean as they walked around the island, when they were alone the walls came down and they shared their histories both good and ill. Childish adventures, grievous losses, sharp betrayals and crazy relatives – there were no forbidden topics between those who shared the same unforgiveable sin.

However, as a saying Beast Boy explained to her put it, for every two steps you pushed forwards something would shove you back one; in this case it was the rest of the team. Or, he explained quietly as he held up the pads for his friend to touch-box, the impact they were having on the rest of the team as a whole and, amid a flurry of jabs, Starfire was forced to agree,

"Friend-Robin has been... more distant," she admitted, though having seen the mess the squire of the Dark Knight had made of the heavy bags after he and Cyborg had been taken down during two-on-two team training last week, Beast Boy considered this an understatement, "but what can we do friend? I would be, uncomfortable speaking to them of such things."

"You and me both Star but we've got to think of something," he replied heavily, tapping her instep with his toe as her stance slipped, "Raven's all about controlling her emotions, maybe we could start with her? Or, at least, find out if we've got any sort-of common ground?"

"You wish to do the digging of the dirt?" He shook his head, expression uncomfortable,

"Not quite Star, it's just that out of all of us she practically screams 'tragic back-story' - finding out about it's going to be like getting blood from a stone but if we can talk to her, let her know..."

"...We are occupying the identical nautical vessel," Starfire finished for him, something that had become more common after he'd begun explaining what human turns of phrase actually meant, "I see friend, I shall begin asking carefully during the talk of girls."

"Yeah, speaking of which you might want to starting talking more often; it's been a while since the two of you did much together."

"The same could be said of you," the princess pointed out tartly, knocking one of his pads aside with a vicious hook, "you should initiate the time of guys more." Beast Boy paled,

"Are you trying to get me killed? Cy's practically adopted you as a little sister and will stop at nothing to make sure your virtue's safe and Rob's, well, he's an idiot for not admitting it but you're his everything and I'm 'stealing' you. Appropriate it might be for the green love-machine but death by jealous boyfriend-in-denial is not how I want to meet my maker."

"Not even for me friend? Am I not worth it?" The changeling snorted, his sparring partner grinning as she took advantage to tap him in the ribs,

"You're getting better," he admitted, rubbing the spot with his elbow before holding the pads up again, "pretty soon you'll be almost as good a jokester as me."

"Almost," she teased before flashing a glance over his shoulder; forewarned, he quickly flipped the rails on their conversation,

"Come on Star, cows gave their lives for these pads so honour their sacrifice."

"Grass-stain said it, pound that leather," a much deeper voice rolled into the conversation as Cyborg dropped a fresh load of plates into the free weight area, "beef always tastes better tenderised." Beast Boy shot a disgusted glance towards the smirking android before giving his attention back to the spar,

"Ignore the carnivore; after we're done I'll whip us up some soybean goodness."

"There's nothin' good about tofu B."

"And you'd know that how Tin-can?" Wincing at the razor riposte Cyborg made to retaliate only for the room to flood red and Robins' voice to boom over the speaker system,

"All Titans to Ops, situation in progress."

Mutually pausing their argument the eldest and youngest heroes charged for the door, though as he wrenched it open Cyborg couldn't help but notice the green teen had dropped back a pace to throw the towel over his shoulder to his sparring partner, who ran it quickly though her damp red tresses as she flew. _That's, or at least that would have been unusual once_ ; running on autopilot Cyborg cycled through his memory banks, picking out the gradual pattern between the two Titans behind him; _a real princess-and-frog story, who knew? Still_ ; much as he didn't agree with Robin's stance on the issue he had to admit that anything becoming official between those two would cause a lot of friction; _Rob's got the hots for the red head but won't admit it and Rae's almost a recluse no B's bugging her less. Them getting together would really have the two birds spitting feathers but whatever happens I can't do anything_ ; admitting uselessness hurt but didn't stop it being the truth; _just be an open ear, a shoulder to cry on and keep what I'm up to_ ; black and yellow flashed through his mind and he grinned furtively as a few memorable moments from Steel City replayed in his head; _well under wraps!_

Crashing through the Ops room door Cyborg immediately scrubbed all thoughts of attractive superheroines from his mind, completely professional as Robin began his breakdown of the problem once all had arrived. Even as he began calculating routes, strategies and likely gas expenditure, however, his organic eye was drawn to the two figures by the side of him and silently hope the team between them could come up with something to keep the two birds from flying the coop if the blossoming relationship continued to bloom.

XXX

"Well, this sucks."

"I agree friend-Garf..."

"Ahem!"

"Apologies friend-Mark, but this does, indeed, suck."

"Don't worry about it Kori, it's Gizmo I'm ticked with – I won't be smelling breakfast for a week!"

"Truly a tragedy..."

"If you get much sarkier I'll start calling you Straven and stop walking, it doesn't suit you."

"If you insist friend."

"I do insist; if you're ever too depressed to fly you come find me, got it?"

"It is gotten friend-Mark; why do you think friend-Robin sent us on an errand to obtain the taking of out? Would not friend-Raven have been much faster?"

"She would but let's hear your ideas first – I know you've got some, your face is an open book."

"A Tamaranean curse, to always have a heart worn on the sleeve."

"True but at least you've got two spare."

"Indeed; however my estimate would be that either friend-Robin does not value our input into solving the new issue of the HIVE of Five or he wishes to give us some privacy so that he is not distracted by what he believes is our relationship of romance. You agree friend?"

"Eh, a little of a, a little of b I'd reckon, and to be fair he's probably right on the input side - I'm more wild ideas and dumb luck than strategy and neither of us can get the rest of the team into the Tower when it's buttoned down. I could sneak in but alone or with only another the numbers aren't on my side and not even you can smash the walls down."

"True, friend-Cyborg did use my strength as a test for our defences of locked down, I would have to fly through your sun to breach th... friend? Friend-Mark why did you stop, and what are you looking at?"

"Star, remember I said earlier about maybe trying to talk to the others, find common ground and all that stuff?"

"Yes...?"

"Forget about it; I've just had a wild idea. It'll either clear the air or break us apart, cause that _rekmas_ thing you told me about but if nothing else it's cleaner than having Rob, Cy or Raven grind the answers out of us. They're not going to like what they hear anyway, we might as well get it all done at once and let them think the worst."

"That is... I cannot do the saying – tell me quickly, what is your idea?"

"Here's what we do..."

XXX

"We need to get back in there."

"So you've said, repeatedly, for the past hour," Cyborg grated, his mechanical eye glowing red as he was rebuffed once more, "damn it I can't get through to our mainframe, one of those goons must have triggered the internal lock-down. And will you stop pacing, it's giving me a headache." Robin's mask crunched together under his frown but to the older teens' relief the Boy Wonder ceased motion, looking out the tiny window of their hopefully-temporary lodgings,

"How the hell did this happen," he asked the world aloud and neither Cyborg nor Raven, meditating silently above the stained kitchenette table, dared answer, knowing their leader was always touchy following one of his plans going sideways, "it was the HIVE Five, it should have been routine."

"But it wasn't; they knew what they were doing and they did it well," Cyborg reminded him, grudging respect for their rivals in his tone despite the great wrongs they'd done to both his team and him personally. With a sigh Robin nodded, massaging his temples as he breathed out the last of his frustrations in a sigh,

"I know, I know they caught us out," the admission was bitter but nevertheless true, "I should have guessed something was wrong when I noticed Wykkd wasn't with them."

"He was," the sudden voice made both boys jump, Raven descending soundlessly to the floor with her lilac eyes sweeping over them both, "I sensed him as we arrived but he vanished – I thought he'd run away."

"Yeah, run right to ma baby," Cyborg growled, recalling the blue screen of death that had flashed in front of his eyes as the T-car had suddenly screeched to a halt amidst the swirling, street-wide melee with the teleporting teen at the wheel.

This shocking development had stunned the Titans enough for their rivals to disengage and pile into (onto, in Mammoth's case) Cyborgs' ride before it roared off in a haze of exhaust fumes. A desperate chase had begun, the T-cars' phenomenal horsepower against the dogged pursuit of the Titan both by road and sky; however just as the heroes seemed to be overhauling their quarry within sight of Jump City bay the tables had turned decisively. The T-car was obliquely connected to the Titan Tower mainframe and Gizmo, they assumed, must have used the link to access part of the central computer, seizing control of the former spacecrafts' defence systems. Forced to scatter under a barrage of long-ranged pot shots, the aerial heroes could only watch as the subterranean passage to their garage yawned open and the hijacked vehicle shot down it, delivering the unsavoury cargo of Kid Wykkd, See-More, Gizmo, Jinx and Mammoth directly into their home and leaving them out in the cold.

It had been both embarrassing and demoralising but, true to form, Robin had contingencies; swiftly turning his back to the Tower he led them to one of the shadier parts of town and ushered them into this safehouse to lick their wounds (almost literally in Beast Boys' case – some of Gizmo's micro-missiles had been packed with chilli powder, raising hell with his sensitive nose). Sending two of the team out for food the Titan leader had quickly started exploring options to get their home back before the HIVE could cause any more problems,

"You're sure you can't get in?"

"Sure as sure can be," Cyborg affirmed grimly, eye powering down as he shook his head before brightening, "still, if I can't do it there's no way that walking cue-ball can. If the HIVE are even out of the garage yet I'll eat a tofu burger sandwiched between both my feet."

"You might want to hold that bet," Raven cut in colourlessly, "couldn't Wykkd teleport through the doors?" Her question, however, only made Cyborg primp himself up even further,

"He could but so what; no, hear me out – he can't, or at least we've never seen him take anything or anyone with him when he pulls a vanishing act so there's nothing he can easily steal. All our important gear is locked in coded trunks only Mammoth could shift and he ain't a tech, so no way he's getting into the system or through the doors."

"So," Robin allowed himself a cautious optimism, "the HIVE are in but, mostly, trapped?"

"Unless Gizmo can crack a nine-digit code that cycles after ninety-nine wrong guesses – I'm not sayin' he can't do it but we've got time. What we need is a plan and that's your department Rob, what you got?"

Realising he was the centre of attention the Boy Wonder nodded and voiced the idea that had been sharpening in his honed mind,

"To be honest you're our best bet Raven," he admitted, noticing she seemed unsurprised, "I know you can get us in even if it'll probably leave you wiped."

"Almost certainly," she affirmed and he grimaced, running the numbers and begrudgingly realising his team had pulled through against worse,

"So that leaves four against five but on our turf; the only problem is Wykkd, he's the wild card. Assuming he can get out of the garage and not let the others out, if we can take him down before he gets a warning out we can ambush them, if not it's a stand-off with their extra man and us having the tower on our side, so I'd give us the edge there."

"But, but ma baby..."

"Sorry Cyborg, even if they've got a hostage we can't negotiate with terrorists," there was the faintest ghost of a smile on Robin's lips as a raincloud sprung to life over the taller teens head, "we need to wait for the others to get back, then hit hard and fast. No matter how good our security is the HIVE are close to a lot of sensitive information; if that falls or is sold into the wrong hands we, and others, are in a lot of trouble."

"There are a lot of 'ifs' in this plan Robin."

"Think I don't know that?" He snapped at Raven's question and the two faced each other down for a tense second, though before Cyborg had to step in to place peace-maker they both backed down, "Sorry Raven, I'm as unhappy about it as you are but it's about all we've got unless you want to try breaking in with brute force. We've got to trust the HIVE aren't running free apart from maybe one of them, though I suppose it'd be too much to hope Kid traps himself in a broom closet or something?"

"Or triggers some of our in-built defences," the dark Titan added, a slight quirk to her lips, "if Beast Boy's left the lid off his washing basket he might never be found."

"And if he opens the fridge he's got a fight on his hands," Cyborg chuckled, getting in on the act, "in our house the leftovers eat you!" Despite the situation Robin gave a short laugh, the image of the silent teen squaring up to the fuzzy blue stuff in their icebox humorous until Raven's question popped the illusion,

"Speaking of the culinary and hygienically-challenged, shouldn't they be back by now?"

The sudden reminder had Robin checking his watch, eyebrow raising as he registered a slight but not yet concerning delay,

"Maybe but you know what they're both like; one of them probably saw something in a shop window, and I banned BB from flying with food don't forget. That was a dropping no-one needed."

"Least of all the delivery rider it landed on," Cyborg snorted, recalling Robin handing over a very generous tip to the grease-stained visor in apology, "pizza guy creamed by a falling pizza, there's a joke in there somewhere."

"Doubtless a good one, hence by Beast Boy never made it," Raven quipped before her expression became slightly more concerned, "should we call?"

"Give them another five minutes, they could be airborne," Robin pointed out, "we've got an idea but it needs fine-tuning. I'd ideally like us to land in the Ops room but I'm open to other suggestions." In the fractional silence that followed and remembering what he'd seen earlier Cyborg saw a gamble and, crossing his mechanical fingers, rolled the dice,

"That why you sent BB and Star food-shoppin' Rob?"

It was a double-edged question and the mechanically-minded teen was in no doubt Robin knew it – if a picture was worth a thousand words, the look the masked crime fighter shot him was easily worth ten times that,

"They were the least likely to help – Beast Boy would likely come up with a hundred ideas and maybe two of them would work better than the one we've got but we don't have time to sift through them and Starfire's not that strategic." _Factual but not admitting anything deeper_ ; no, that Cyborg had expected anything else but even the hint of hesitation Robin had betrayed was telling; _this is going to have to come to a head soon, for Robin's blood pressure if nothing else_. Not willing to poke the bear any harder, however, Cyborg nodded as though he hadn't noticed anything,

"Good point, though the grass stain does knock it out the park occasionally..."

"A stopped clock if right twice a day,"; _ouch_ ; Raven's sardonic humour was even more biting than normal, as though not being regularly drained on Beast Boys' bad jokes was letting it become even more concentrated; _and if she's taking shots when he's not here, man even Raven must be feeling left out, not that she'll ever admit it._

"Maybe but we ain't got hours in the day right n... huh?" Interrupted by a sudden beeping from his arm Cyborg flipped up a panel on it and raised an eyebrow, "Well, talk of the devil – we're bust planning here green-bean, where's out take-out?"

"Been taken away," the remote reply brimmed with joy, "get back to the Tower, we're having ourselves a good old fashioned Tamaranean cook-out."

XXX

Even Raven gawped, all three Titans stunned mute by the audacity of the statement before Cyborg, cleaning his ear with a pinkie, managed to answer,

"Uh, you wanna run that by me again B?"

"Get back to the Tower," the changeling repeated, "Star and I cleaned house and we're in the mood to party." Shaking his head as though beset by flies the eldest member of the team made to speak again only for another voice to cut him off,

"You and Starfire have taken back the Tower?" Beast Boy didn't answer immediately, Robin left to fume as a snigger filtered through the communicator,

"Told you he'd never buy it Star, and no mustard," the faintness of the voice was quickly banished as Beast Boy must have turned his attention back to the communicator, "always the tone of surprise Rob, oh ye of little faith."

"Can you blame him?" Raven added drolly, Cyborg lancing her with a warning look as Robin, oblivious to everything but his need for answers, pressed on,

"How did you get in?"

"Star dropped me off, I let her in – it's a long story."

"You took down the HIVE?"

"Had to; our table can't seat ten and you know what happened last time we tried eating Stars' food off our laps," even Cyborg winced at that memory, "don't panic, I'm supervising this time."

"How reassuring," as that comment brought sharp glares from both team mates present Raven fell silent, recusing herself from the conversation as Robin asked the most pressing dilemma in this seeming miracle,

"Where are the HIVE now?"

"Uh, dealt with – look I don't have time for twenty questions right now, I'm trying to keep the cookery monster on a tight leash. Just come home and we'll explain over dinner, and no hanging on Raven's skirt to get here," the dark teen blinked, take off-guard by the changelings' use of her name, "we've not long started cooking so give us some time to get ready. Green machine out."

Cyborg gently easing the raised screen in his arm down was the only thing that broke the sudden silence; he so desperately wanted to make a quip, a wry comment, hell even a bad, Beast Boy-esque pun but the words deserted him. For long seconds the trio were silent, unmentioned emotions billowing about them like storm clouds before Robin dispersed the tension by turning sharply towards the door,

"Come on," he said shortly, face unreadable, "Beast Boy wouldn't joke about something like this. Let's find out what he and Starfire have done and how – we can deal with the HIVE and work out how to upgrade our defences from there."

Raven and cyborg shared a look before following their leader, the journey to the street and beyond taking place in a pregnant shock, the absence of noise that often preceded a great deliverance, or a great calamity.

XXX

As the shadows cleared from his vision Robin instinctively shot his arm sideways in case his team mate had overtaxed herself; fortunately Raven was still aloft after such a short hop, looking down at the scene before them all. Even as his eyes went front, however, Robin was taken aback by the scent that hit his nose, something his third team mate had immediately picked up on,

"Umm, smells good Star; what's cookin'?"

"A dish of mystery friend-Cyborg," resplendent in her apron and mustard-jar chefs' hat, a funny novelty from Beast Boy to honour mastering her first human meal a few months back (a tossed salad, but still progress), the alien glanced over from the pot she was stirring with one hand while the other quivered a colander, drips of steaming water escaping from its perforated bottom into the sink, "it will be a few moments yet."

"Which we'd have had if you three had done as you were told," a grumpier voice cut in, Beast Boy glowering at them from where he was laying the table, "no teleporting ring a bell?"

"Yeah but we ain't got a bell to ring B, least of all when the garage door is on the fritz."

"It is? Oh, sorry, we didn't realise," the changeling admitted, meticulously laying the last fork perpendicular to its parent plate, "Gizmo likely shorted it to stop us following him."

"Speakin' of small-and-bald..."

"Where are the HIVE?" Robin finished from him, having surveyed the scene for damages and found nothing amiss in the common room; _now we just have to work out damages from the fight to subdue them – another late night with the budget sheet_ ;

"In the garage, waiting for the meat-wagon." Masked eyes narrowed,

"You didn't put them in the holding cells?" Beast Boy shook his head,

"No need after Star and I were done with them; you don't need to check," there was something more than lackadaisical confidence in the younger hero's tone, an edge he'd not heard often that gave Robin pause from heading off to investigate their new prisoners, "Star handled prepping them, you trust her right?"

Unseen by the two duos in this drama Cyborg winced; _B's not pulling any punches, right to the ego. I'd better step in_ ;

"You know he does grass stain," the android answered, gently slapping the Boy Wonder on the back, "nothin' gets up after our princess gets through with it. Just promise me one thing though, they didn't hurt ma baby?"

"Not even a scratch friend-Cyborg, though I believe the _clorbag_ Kid of Wykkd may have altered the configuration of the seating." This was met with an anguished wail, Cyborg almost falling to his knees as he buried his face in his hands,

"Oh ma poor, poor precious baby girl – daddy's gonna fix you right up, yeah he is, right after he's had a bowl of whatever's smellin' so good. Nearly done Star?" As she nodded her kitchen overseer chuckled,

"Attaboy Cy, got your priorities straight." At his friends' thumbs-up the changeling shook his head and reached for a napkin only to leap back with a yelp of shock as he came eye to toecaps with a pair of blue boots. Gazing down imperiously from above the table Raven let her eyes glow faintly as she folded her arms,

"What was that about me and skirts Beast Boy?"

"It was that or your broomstick; whoever Azar is He knows you've usually got one of them stuck up somewhere," the riposte was so sharp and unexpected her levitation almost faltered, the shapeshifter calling on the merciless training of a former life to keep his mind blank, "now are you eating with us or going back to your room – I want to finish setting the table."

As he wafted a hand as though shooing her away Raven drifted backwards, seemingly unaffected by his tart reply but internally suppressing a lament that had only gotten louder recently. For all she cursed his lame humour, stupid ideas and loud mouth Beast Boy had always been open to her, talking and acting as though he had nothing to hide and no reason to hide it. Beneath her third eye his moods had been a chaotic jumble but now everything was submerged, converted to raging undercurrents beneath the falsely-calm surface of the mind she was now brushing. Logically Raven knew why this had happened, had anticipated and worked towards it even; she was, after all, best off alone; but she hadn't expected Beast Boy drifting away from her to hurt as sharply as it did. _Perhaps because he's not just leaving, he's gravitating towards someone else_ ; one of her fractured emotions, Knowledge maybe, echoed in her mind and she distantly heard other aspects of her psyche agree, though their suggestions for what to do about it varied from the untenable (Brave) to the unprintable (Rage, Rude, or maybe Love or Lust, she could seldom separate the latter two outside of Nevermore).

Her boot soles suddenly scraping Cyborgs' shoulder jolted her from her introspection; reeling her consciousness in, she found herself halfway through Beast Boy's answer to what have been Robin's enquiry,

"...don't weigh much, so I floated down after Star dropped me from above the roof defences maximum range and they couldn't track me, I was too small. Once down I squeezed under the door and disabled them, letting Star in – she remembered the Ops room codes, though with lockdown on we could only go form one of those peri-thingy consoles..."

"Peripheral," Raven correctly instinctively, internally cursing herself for the slip but showing nothing, not even hurt, as Beast Boy merely nodded rather than thanking her as he used to,

"...Yeah, one of them. It got us a basic base layout and highlighted the Five, still stuck downstairs," Cyborg clenched a fist in triumph, "so we had a think and came up with a plan, especially once Star realised one of them was on the other side of the garage door to the others. I went to deal with him while Star went to the medbay."

"Medbay?" Robin parroted, looking to the alien with raised eyebrows, "What did you need from there Star?"

"All the canisters of the gas of knocking out," she answered shortly, attention fixed on crumbling a few green leaves into her simmering pan, "I arrived in time to see friend-Beast Boy do some knocking out of his own, it was glorious."

"Too right; Wykkd had his ear to the door, Gizmo was shouting through to him - gecko to the ceiling, drop down into gorilla and goodnight nurse. You might have to beat the dent out of your garage door later Cy. Once he was out Star shoved the gas bottles into the air ducts and I switched the fan on, they had nowhere to go. We gave it five minutes then stormed the place; they were halfway to Lala-land, we just sandbagged them the rest of the way and before you say anything Rob," the changeling saw the masked boys' lips twitch and tripped up a potential criticism, "once they were secure we switched the fan on full power to blow the gas out, I know it's not good to be out for too long."

"Clever, and a very good plan," the team leader admitted after a seconds' thought, "but the gas didn't affect you?"

"I can hold my breath through space friend-Robin, and friend-Beast Boy wore a different skin," Starfire explained, rapping her ladle against the rim of the pot, "I think we are ready. Friend-Beast Boy could you perform the serving of the pasta?"

"Sure can Star; to your places people," he suddenly demanded, clapping his hands officially before glancing up, "you joining us Raven? You never said earlier?"

Settling to the floor, face impassable, the enchantress merely nodded and made for the seat Cyborg had pulled out for her, sitting down and denying the weight that thumped into her stomach as Beast Boy took the colander in exchange for a grateful smile. Raven was neither blind nor stupid and to miss what was going on before her she'd have to be both – the sensible, logical and wistful parts of her wished them both luck, her cynical side snarked they'd need it and the rest she pointedly ignored, focussing on holding in her powers despite the bitterness swirling in her stomach. _How did that film say it, ogres don't have happy endings_ ; even as she sought inner peace to prevent collateral damage she masochistically twisted the knife in her chest; _I guess demons don't either_.

XXX

As a self-confessed connoisseur of gastronomic experiences Cyborg was already trying to work out what his team mate had whipped up even as Beast Boy filled their pre-warmed bowls with thin pasta strings. The spaghetti, however, was spared maybe half a glance before the main puzzle arrived, ladled onto Robin's plate as he nodded in thanks with a carefully neutral expression, though unusually the Tamaranean seemed not to notice as she hovered towards him,

"Just do the saying of when, friend-Cyborg."

"Heh, don't tempt me Star – with how good this smells I might take a vow of silence." The alien giggled, moving off after depositing two full dollops of what looked like thick, meaty stew over his spaghetti. _It's not bolognaise there's too much mince, but that gravy is nice and thick;_ leaning forward under the pretence of taking a deep whiff of the rising steam, Cyborg quickly scanned the stew with his mechanical eye. Though the meal as too well-mixed to get a solid return on the ingredients, the dish as a whole wasn't toxic, inorganic or moving, so it looked like the proof of this pudding would be in the eating. Unfortunately, manners dictated he had to wait for the others to be served before he could start but that didn't stop him reaching for the cutlery, though as he did he immediately noticed something that twanged his finely-honed pranking sense,

"Hey, how come you're chowin' down B; this ain't that nasty tofu gack is it?" His answer was a dismissive snort,

"Come on Cy, you know what tofu looks like."

"Unfortunately," the android grumbled, shuddering as Robin cut in,

"So this is another meat substitute?"

"I don't eat animals do I; said that since day one, or night one as things turned out."

"That is correct, this is something all of us can eat," Starfire added, sinking into her seat as she returned from placing the pan back on the now-switched off hob, "I am glad we are all here as family to celebrate the beating of the HIVE of Five and reclamation of the Tower if Titans. So friends, please do the tucking of in and enjoy."

A minute or so later, after he'd had a chance to sample the evidence and draw some basic conclusions, Cyborg recalled the princess's words as he disguised a glance around the table with a sip of the fizzy water Beast Boy had poured to accompany the meal; _eat yes, enjoy not so much._ The atmosphere around the table was already thicker than the sauce of their meal and curdling fast; any moment now it would crush one of the other four. Sat almost shoulder to shoulder neither Beast Boy nor Starfire were making any secret of their closeness, seemingly oblivious to the occasional black shadow rattling the condiments or Robin's grip deforming his cutlery. Shaking his head slightly the team mechanic tried not to think about how this could get worse – the last thing he needed was to jinx them, or have the actual Jinx show up and do it for him; _man, HIVE in the basement, team about to unleash a tidal wave of teen angst and me without my floaties on._

It was obvious was coming – either Beast Boy or Star would officially make a claim or one of the other two would call them out on it, and either way he was right in the blast zone. Not for the first time he wished Karen were here; another almost-adult in the house might limit the shockwaves when it all came to a head, and it would be awesome to see her again; but she was hundreds of miles away so it was going to be up to him. All he could do was endure this stifling silence until one of the others breached it and his did this with a very simple routine. Lower arm, twirl fork, raise arm, yum; the taste of the mince was completely drowned by the pepperiness of the sauce and he couldn't quite place the texture, though Star had fried it prior to adding it to the stew as he could tell it had been seared; swallow, check for attempted-stroke-successful murder being committed around the tale and rep... ack, error, error, glitch detected!

"Uck! Ah, thanks Star," he chortled, extracting a long, thin something from between his teeth, "complements of the chef huh?"

He wasn't bothered by a rogue hair; to be honest he was sometimes jealous the others had so much more to lose than he did in that regard. He was halfway through blowing the offending strand over his shoulder when a sudden gasp had him look over to see Raven's face shrink to about ninety percent eyes, their shocked gaze fixed on his fingers. Unsettled by the sorceress's uncharacteristically strong reaction Cyborg made to calm his younger team mate before glancing at the cause of the disturbance and belatedly realising what was wrong with the picture.

Pink.

Starfire's hair wasn't pink.

So where had...?

Even as the pieces started to fit together there was a clatter as Robin dropped his knife and fork, staring across the table as he fought to speak over the sudden clenching in his gut,

"What is this?"

"A hair," Beast Boy's answer was a monotone to rival Ravens as he swallowed his last mouthful, "we must have missed one, sorry." Robin swallowed as well, a bitter taste at the back of his throat as he realised...; _no, no this is not happening, it can't be!_ ;

"Is this, this is a joke?" There was a faint rustle as Starfire shook her head, the expression draining the blood from the Boy Wonders' face as she faced his square on,

"Are either of us laughing friend-Robin?" In that aloof, cold expression he couldn't recognise the girl who had crashed into his world, locked her lips to his and drawn out both his language and his heart, "I wished for us all to share a meal, friend-Beast Boy suggested something we could all share."

"Beast Bo..." Cyborg trailed off, face shrinking as though dunked in icy water as he beheld the dread transformation, Sméagol corrupted to Gollum in a heartbeat as the changeling dead-eyed him,

"I don't eat animals do I Cy?" Suddenly his flattened ears weren't comical, his smiling fangs didn't look so cute and Cyborg felt very small and very afraid in the face of this new, feral predator, "look on the bright side though, it's not tofu."

"Where," Robin had to swallow thickly, his gorge rising like a tide, "the HIVE, where?"

"As friend-Beast Boy said friend-Robin," Starfire nodded over Ravens' shoulder, the sorceress staring horrified at the shaking knife in her hand, "they are in the garage, awaiting the wagon of meat."

A split-second of silence followed the reminder, then a trio of chairs crashed to the floor as their owners lurched upright, stumbling away with horrified gazes fixed half on their twisted team mates and half on the exit. With one mind the three acted, running as best they could with heaving guts and churning minds towards the stairs; shadows flickered and lights popped around them, Raven's flight erratic as her eyes swam with tears, a faint but horribly familiar laugh echoing in the back of her mind. She couldn't have... they were her friends, they wouldn't have tricked her into crossing that demonic threshold; _but what do I really know? How much have they both changed_ ; she didn't dwell on it, she couldn't - for the sake of her fracturing sanity she plunged down the stairwell, heedless that she was outpacing the other two and to their pleas for her to wait. After a second and an eternity the featureless grey door, a very slight dent the only indication of the scuffle not an hour ago, reared up before her, as foreboding as the bars blocking the way to her fathers' realm as she raised a trembling hand to it. Subtlety was impossible, instead shadows spread over the silvery metal and it deformed under the pressure of her sickened emotions – rather than wrench the portal aside, however, she mouthed a silent please to a god she'd long been convinced held no love for one such as her and before looking through the veil her soul-self had made in the steel.

XXX

The sudden shaking made Robin stumble and somehow Cyborg vaulted over him, the landing floor cracking under his titanium tonnage as he crashed down. He barely noticed, instead sprinting forwards to crash the small ball of darkness bobbing backwards from the door to his chest, gritting his teeth as Raven's magic constricted around his armour. His hand found her back and patted it, hoping to calm the wounded girl down before she truly lost control and burying the logical reason behind her reaction under concern for his friend. Robin darted past them, balance recovered as she sprinted for the door panel and tried to control his shaking hand; _we don't know_ ; he forced himself to remember that fact; _Beast Boy and Starfire told us we've... but beyond that hair we've no actual proof. We know Jinx is in the Tower and that's her hair, it matches her colour – we find her, we find out._ Logic, however, didn't stop his mouth from drying out or the palsy afflicting his stomach and fingers – he had to enter the code three times, fumbling it twice due to the trembling. Numb with terrified disbelief, bewildered that his friends could or would do or even joke about something like this the Boy Wonder watched the small collection of green stars on the input panel, trying to steel himself before with one stab of his finger he hit the big green button.

Even warped by Raven's power the door opened with a whoosh, the noise echoed by the breath leaving Robins' lungs as though he'd been punched as his eyes adjusted to the gloom. He collapsed against the doorframe, teeth locking up as horror squeezed his eyes shut; now he had his proof, all the wretched proof he could wish for. Like silent jurors the five dark shapes hung, damning him for an unmeant sin and he could do nothing to repute their silent reproach. All emotions were flushed from his mind, even the queasiness that had all but crippled him on the run here faded as his beleaguered brain was too overawed to feel – only his senses endured. Trying to find his feet and push off the cold door frame he felt as much as heard Cyborg clomp up to him, his heavy steps drowning out the faint creaking from the in front of him; _creaking?_ Even as the question echoed in his now-empty mind he could only watch as Cyborg, teeth gritted in fury and with Raven clutched close to his chest, stomped into the room and threw his arm sideways, mashing the light switch so hard it cracked but not before fulfilling its purpose and illuminating what the darkness had hidden from his friends but not his robotic eye.

Once he blinked the after-images away the sight that met Robin's eyes almost made him pass out in relief. In brightness the five shadows were resolved as strange black shapes hanging like mouldy fruit from an overhead pipe in the garage; only after tilting his head did he suddenly recognise them as the HIVE Five. All their rival teens had been cocooned in thick black gaffa tape and suspended by their ankles, a position doubtless uncomfortable but, mercifully, none of them were missing any extremities, or were wounded at all from what he could see. _They didn't, we haven't..._ ; the realisation was almost as heavy as the guilt had been but even as he tried to articulate the profoundness of his relief a sudden clink from ahead whipped his gaze forwards to spot movement. One of the cocoons was twisting, the occupant visibly struggling until it finally revolved to face them, cat-like eyes widening as their owner tried to suddenly shriek through the strip of black over her mouth,

"Jinx!"

The sight of someone in distress triggered Robins professionalism; in an instant he was by the suspended girls' side with one hand on her shoulder to stop her spinning as he crouched down, grateful he couldn't see any injuries even as he noticed the obvious problem,

"This'll hurt," even suffering she rolled her eyes so with one swift movement he ripped the tape away with a wince, "sorry I..."

"Scratch my back!"

"Uhh," blindsided by the odd request Robin only blinked as his team mates came up beside him, "wha...?"

"Scratch my back," the hex mistress implored, tears glistening in her eyes as she continued to writhe, "oh god please, please I can't take anymore! I'll do juvie, I'll do anything you want just do it!"

"Uhh, okay," completely at a loss Robin gently spun the inverted sorceress around and rubbed between her shoulder blades; Jinx gasped, her muscles going ridged even through her unusual bandages and he paused,

"Keep doing that," the sudden demand had him jump-start his ministrations, cheeks pinkening as the other teen arched against his fingertips almost voluptuously, "all over, I need you to keep doing that; oh that's _soooooo_ good!" Seeing his leader preoccupied and letting Raven go after she'd convinced herself the HIVE were unharmed Cyborg took over the questioning,

"Jinx what happened?"

"Less talking more scratchie; lower, lower no the other lowaaaahahahaaaa, that's the spot, right there!"

"Are you... hang on I've got an idea – Cy take over," once the former HIVE infiltrator had done so Robin reached into his belt and withdrew a small spray bottle, "okay this should help." Holding the tip about an inch from her back he carefully depressed the nozzle, releasing a thin white mist that quickly frosted the back of their rivals' prison,

"Ahh," the sudden chill made the pinkette gasp and stiffen, then as the cooling sensation banked the fire that had been consuming her back she slowly relaxed in bliss, "oh that's magic. Robin I take back everything I ever said about you, you're my hero."

"I'm flattered," there was perhaps a trace of humour in his voice as he methodically worked the ice spray, an anti-sprain precaution he habitually carried in case of training accidents, down her body, "what happened to you five?"

Jinx fell silent for a moment, though Robin didn't stop administering the unusual medication until Cyborg was able to step back, a hand on Ravens' shoulder as she dried her eyes on her robe, still laid out by the emotional haymakers the two absent Titans had put them through. _We'll deal with them later_ ; even as the thought crossed him mind, however, Cyborg was at a loss how to deal with them – there was no way he could scrub their expressions from his mind, the chill that struck through him when he recalled the monster his little green buddy had become colder than the frost on Jinx's prison,

"I, uh, I don't really know; could you get me down, the blood's rushed to my head." Robin glanced up and Cyborg made to reach for the strip of tape suspending her only to see it suddenly glow black. Forewarned, he instead slid his arms under Jinx, straightening hr out gradually and letting her reacclimatise to being level before Ravens' power snapped the band easily. Lowering his former fellow HIVE student to the floor on her front the mechanical teen stepped back as Jinx squinted up at them, the redness in her cheeks not entirely due to her prolonged inversion,

"Umm, fancy meeting you three here?" She attempted weakly, though her feeble smile quickly wilted under another bout of squirming, "Oh no, make with the magic spray bird-boy, I'm thawing out." Trying to place her symptoms Robin decided on a few gentle enquiries as he reached into his belt again, fishing for a specific disk he could quickly modify for their current needs,

"Are you burnt?"

"I don't know, it feels like it, or I've been stung by your green pet," she groused sourly, "anyway you should know, you did it."

"We didn't," Raven interjected, a faint quaver in her tone she quickly made to quash; _nothing happened, we have done nothing wrong – but what about...? Never mind that now Knowledge, we will find out but we must make sure the other two haven't hurt the HIVE first_ ; "we were called back to the Tower by Starfire and, and Beast Boy, they were the ones who took you down." Quirking an eyebrow at the sudden hitch in the normally emotionless girls' speech Jinx's eyes suddenly widened as her words sank in,

"The ditz and the dog-face? It was just them?"

"You doubt my word?"

"No but those two, that's just embarrassing," the rival mage groaned, chin on the floor in depressed defeat, "we're never getting hired again." Cyborg folded his arms,

"Though you were freelance these days? Anyway," he quickly slewed the conversation back on track, "what happened down here and how did you idiots hack ma baby?" Despite herself Jinx chuckled before hissing through her teeth,

"Ahh, damn it Robin I'm dying over here!" The masked crime fighter nodded, holding up a flat metal circle so their prone opponent could clearly see it,

"This is one of my freeze disks, I've modified it so it lets out a spray of very cold gas upwards that should settle onto you. I'm going to put it on your back," he waited until the hope had just reached her eyes, "as soon as you answer Cyborgs' question." Only the fact it was already on the floor stopped her jaw dropping,

"What?! Oh gimme a break, you're a hero!"

"I am – I'm also looking for answers and you've got them."

"I'll give them to you," she promised, eyes widening as the resurgent itch made her squirm involuntarily, making her resemble a large ebon caterpillar, "please, come on I'm in agony."

"I don't doubt it – talk fast." Cat-like eyes glittered with venom but, realising he wasn't going to back down, Jinx started speaking quickly,

"We worked out Kid could teleport into that hunk of junk, Giz jury-rigged a remote hacker he could use to hot-wire it once he got in. We were going to ransom or sell it; Ding-Dong Daddy's willing to pay big for the schematics; but once we were on the road Giz realised he could open your garage door. Change of plan, we dived down here but got trapped, couldn't get through that door over there and by then Mammoth had smashed the control panel to the way out so you couldn't come after us. Robin please," she broke off with a half-shriek as a spike of pseudo-agony speared between her shoulder-blades, "you're torturing me now, this isn't fair!"

"Nor's life," the masked teen muttered, though at Cyborgs' reproachful glare and Ravens' nod to confirm the hex mistress wasn't lying he knelt at her side, disk in hand. Carefully placing it in the middle of her slim back he pressed the ignition stud and withdrew as the hiss of gas, the searing cold prompting an involuntary warble of unfettered relief from Jinx a few seconds later,

"Praise the merciful bird-boy; I owe you a favour Robin," a sudden spark of mischief made her cock her head coquettishly and lower her voice to a purr, "sexual or otherwise." _Gotcha_ ; only years of playing poker against multiple Billy Numerouses kept her face straight as Robin's composure slipped, a red tint spreading over his cheeks as before he managed to glare at her,

"Just finish your story Jinx." She thought about making another saucy comment but the realisation he could knock the disk off easily convinced her to stick to the facts,

"So we couldn't get out but Kid could – he teleported through the door but be couldn't get word out to him, our radios aren't that good. He was trying to open it with Giz shouting through after Mammoth couldn't break it down and my hexes failed, even See-More's laser couldn't cut it – what is that thing made of? Oh, sorry," she managed a chagrined chuckle as Robin's folded arms told her she was drifting off track, "so the boys were at the door or lounging about while I get a ladder and start trying to wriggle into the air vent, then the ruddy fan came on, cold air right to the face. I dropped down and my eyes were streaming; once I cleared them out I realised I was smelling something other than my team mates. I tried to warn them but everything was blurry, went for the T-car but only got the door open before my knees went, ended up slumped half in, half out the damned thing. One of you lot, must have been the alien bimbo, dragged me out and got a squeeze on my neck, I was too out of it to fight back; next thing I know I woke up with my feet over my head and spine on fire. Anyway why are you asking me this, didn't the other two tell you – I can't imagine the Incredible Punk keeping his mouth shut about winning big?"

Jinx wasn't the most intelligent of the Five, that honour went to Gizmo; what made her the de facto leader of the junior villains was her common sense. She had an eye for opportunity, a nose for a bargain and more importantly the brains to recognise both, so at the uncomfortable looks the three Titans shot each other she held her tongue, not wanting to raise awkward questions while she and her team were so vulnerable,

"We, uh," Cyborg, the traitor she couldn't really hate despite her best efforts, began uncertainly before finding his courage, "we just wanted to check their story, we didn't believe it. Aw man," she had to give him credit, he wasn't the worst liar she'd ever seen; _close second to Mammoth maybe, but not the worst_ ; "now I gotta grill that soy-bean slop tomorrow."

"Better than what we'll be eating," Jinx sighed mind awhirl with possibilities despite her casual tone, "you call the usuals for us?"

"They'll be here shortly," Robin assured her, motioning for the other two to follow him to the door and speaking over his shoulder, "don't go anywhere." Wincing at the unnecessary reminder Jinx rallied enough to nip at his heels,

"Har-de-har-har; don't give up your day job birdy-boy, you suck as a comedian," she called, desperate to get the last word in even as, from this angle, she was forced to regard the crime fighter a little differently. _Not a beefcake by any means but those buns_ ; watching said anatomy walk away the hex girl almost licked her lips; _me-ow! Aha, idea!_ ;

"Hey Robin," as he glanced over his shoulder she tipped him a salacious wink, "I hate owing people; look me up soon!"

As his face exploded in a blush she laughed, stopping only when the door came down and sealed her in with the rest of the comatose idiot squad. As her mirth subsided she was careful to lie still and not disturb the little bliss-giver on her back, the sibilant hiss of pressured gas releasing dousing her irritation as she rested her cheek on the floor and hid the forthcoming reality of a stretch in the pen behind the memory of a pair of firm spandexed glutes.

XXX

Either through strength deserting them or relief overwhelming them all three teenagers nearly collapsed outside the garage door, slumping against the nearest wall of the door itself as though they'd just run a marathon. For a long moment there were no words, they spoke with their eyes and faces alone until a nearly silent mechanical whirr broke the still, Cyborg wiping his clammy brow as he glanced at the other two,

"They didn't...?" Robin shook his head,

"No, not tonight but, they have?"

"They must have," even Raven's monotone was faint with recollection, "we all saw their faces and I, I felt..." she hesitated, unwilling to brave even the memory without taking a breath, "...cold, they were both cold, like they were making themselves not feel anything. Beast Boy's never been that distant and Starfire," she shook her head, agony bleeding from her expression, "I never thought, never _dreamed_ she could be emotionless."

"I just," Cyborg looked dazed, staring at his hands as though the answer might write itself on his palm, "I don't, I can't believe they'd, either of them, would be able to. How, and why...?"

"I don't know," Robin placed a hand on his companions' forearm, taking several fortifying breaths, "but I know how to find out. They sent us down here for answers and we got them, eventually," the last word was a grumble, his pride pricked by the hex maidens' last laugh, "now we need to finish the puzzle."

"They're waiting for us," Raven deduced, quailing at the thought of facing those marble impersonations of her friends before a hand on her shoulder made her jump, neither boy reacting to the light above them blowing out from her shock,

"Got it in one little sis," Cyborg said solemnly, feeling the empath tremble and holding on until the tremors began to subside, "I, I think I might get why they've done this, hell why they've been getting on so well recently, but only they can tell us. Come on," he led the way, gently ushering Raven along until she alighted to the air and matched his pace, "we'll take the elevator this time."

XXX

The ping of arrival was like a bell tolling, the swoosh of the doors a veil parting but the sight before them all was, somehow, both the best and worst simultaneously. Three regarded two for long, pregnant moments as silence shrouded them all until,

"Quorn."

"Uh, what?" Cyborg cringed as the question left him reflexively but Beast Boy, mercifully deflated from the gangrel creature he had become, gave a wan, watery smile,

"Quorn," he repeated, gesturing to the now-empty table as the dishes had been removed, "it's like tofu, meat substitute. I saw it on offer in one of the stores on the way to Pizza Palace, that's when I came up with this whole idea."

"Right," Robin agreed, another question springing to mind to postpone the moment, "what did you do to Jinx?"

"Jinx? She was awake?"

"Awake and suffering – what did you do?"

"Itching powder," there was a note of pride in Beast Boy's voice, "she tried to get into the T-car so I reckoned she didn't get as much gas as the others and Star couldn't squeeze for too long, she not mastered sleeper holds yet. While she wrapped up the others I realised Jinx needs to concentrate or do one of her funky dances before she can use her bad luck powers, a tube of that down the back of her shirt would put paid to that until the police showed up. Same reason Wykkd and See-More are going to lose their eyebrows when the tape comes off and Mammoth's wrapped in about five layers of it – they can't see to use their powers and Mammoth can't bring his strength into play." All three in the elevator swapped glances and nodded at this bit of good sense, not willing to be the one to lance the boil until, gathering whatever scraps of courage remained, one stepped forward and did what needed to be done,

"What happened?"

As Beast Boy's face collapsed and he was forced to look away Raven silently, cursed herself; even at his most annoying she'd never wanted to hurt him like this. The emotions around her were so heavy she could barely breathe and his were the most grievously wounded of all – though she had always logically known she was part-demon, feeling the gangrenous reaction her words had caused was the closest she'd come to emotionally believing it,

"The Citadel," Starfire's voice was brittle and her eyes were wet but she stood tall with a hand on Beast Boys' shoulder, "those who rule it are practical to the extreme. Gladiatorial combat to determine the most effective warriors and alterations was common and most fights were to the death; I did not know what became of the dead until much later," she looked down, tears falling like rain and suddenly Beast Boys' hand was atop her own, supporting her just as he was being supported, "my sister and I were not the only ones taken from Tamaran. The others, many of the fell and I exhorted X'Hal for their peace; I should, should have realised how I and the other survivors were being sustained but I did not," as her shoulders shook so did Robins' clenched fists, the anguish of someone he cared for so deeply scouring him like no taunts of Slade ever had, "not until it was far too late."

"It's all right Star, it's all right," somehow Beast Boy half-stood, his arm around the princess's waist as he slowly eased her into her seat, never letting go of the hand on her shoulder, "you didn't know, I did. Yeah, you heard, I knew, kind of," he saw hands cover mouths, eyes widen with disbelieving horror but was too numb to care, wrung out from holding the earlier charade together for too long, "remember the rule of three? Three minutes without air, three days without water and three weeks without food? Three weeks is about right but what they don't tell you is after a week or so things start to... blur, like you're not sure if you're awake or dreaming. It's strange, part of you knows what's real and normal but the rest doesn't or can't care," _he's not talking to us_ ; even as Raven's vision broke every tear-given lens reflected those glazed green eyes, the changeling lost in a past she'd never cared enough to learn, "so when they throw you meat, that part of you recognises it and screams that it's wrong but you don't care, it doesn't feel real - you do what it takes to survive. But it knows, that little voice knows you're going to wake up so it tells you what you want, no what you have to hear. You don't eat animals – I mean," he laughed, a broken cackle that was the cruellest sound of all, "you _are_ the animals so you don't eat them, that's not right. And you make it true and because it's true; what you ate wasn't an animal; you don't think about it, you never forget but you don't think about it. Not until you find someone else," he looked across, emerald meeting fluorescent jade as he finished, his voice a husk, "someone who knows the same things you know and is brave enough to talk about them, for your sake and hers."

The common room was still, Cyborgs' theory from downstairs confirmed as the alien and the shapeshifter held each other's weeping eyes. It was not, as at least two of the other three had feared, love that had drawn their team mates together but something much darker but perhaps even deeper than that bright emotion. Forcing down deep breaths Beast Boy was the first to look away, his smile faint as he slowly removed his hand from the princess's own, Starfire nodding silently as she reclaimed her hand from his shoulder; _now they have the truth, and it will be rekmas or it will not._ She had, or at least thought she had prepared for this but her memory was blank, the words were not there but before she could begin to panic a low, anguished moan broke the silence, Cyborg's remaining natural eye wide and horror-struck,

"No, no-no-no," eidetic, infallible computer memory was as much boon as curse, "B I am so sorry! I, I'd never..."

"Of course you didn't," though thin, the forgiveness in the changelings' tone was something the older teen clung to like a lifeline, "how could you have known?"

"Known?" Robin repeated, looking up questioningly as Cyborg mentally berated himself for his unmeant heartlessness,

"I did this, or at least I started it," his face fell into his hand, metal fingers massaging his living eye as he relived the off-the-cuff comment that had cut two of his friends far too deeply, "it ain't cann... it ain't that, that's what I said – we were arguing about what pizzas to get..."

"And I saw friend-Marks' expression change," Starfire finished for him, "I did not know the word so did the looking up of it, then we talked that night."

"For a long time," the animorph took over after letting free a shuddering breath, "we knew things wouldn't be the same afterwards and wanted to tell you, honest, we just had no idea how. I know you thought we were getting close for the wrong reasons Rob, don't try to deny it," he didn't, trying to dry under his mask instead, "but we couldn't just come out and say it. We were going to come to you Rae, start small, but I saw the Quorn on offer and realised we could take out the Five, it came together from there. And now you know," his expression was ambivalent, torn down the middle between relief and despair, "now you know."

The words brought realisation – they _did_ know, they knew so much more than before. As though one mind the trio regarded each other before Raven, finally wrestling down her self-loathing after her earlier question, looking at the changeling again and managed to speak,

"Mark?"

"Garfield Mark Logan," he answered and that the pain in his eyes was receding was a tonic better than any enchantment Azar had taught her, "hold the cat jokes please, I prefer Mark or Gar, and this is princess Koriand'r of Tamaran." Starfire smiled softly at the set-up, though before she could make full introductions as required by the customs of her people she was interrupted by Cyborg taking a step forward,

"I see," his tone was rough but considered as he regarded the two of them levelly, "in that case Mark, princess Koriand'r; Victor Stone, or Vic," he clashed a forearm against his chest softly before holding thumb and forefinger a tiny distance apart, "and some years back, not long before I met all of you I came this close to blowin' my dads' head off."

XXX

 _Did I really look that shocked when they spoke – probably_ ; the black humour was enough to make him smile but the eldest Titan doubted he'd laugh again tonight as he reflected four green eyes with his crimson one, speaking as he stepped forwards again,

"After the accident, y'know the one that left me like this, I didn't know how hard dad worked to fix me – he damn near killed himself, ended up admitted to hospital with exhaustion just before I came online. I was left on my own, like this; Ma didn't make it out the lab," metal fingers clenched, tremors breaking out across his enhanced frame as long-forgotten demons needled his mind anew, "I hated it, every second. Everything was different, couldn't do anything from my old life; no skate-boarding, no football an' friends," he laughed, a black, ugly noise, "forget it – I wasn't Vic any more, nah I was Robocop or the Terminator or Tin-man, and after I put my fist through a cafeteria table to get them to shut up there went my scholarship dreams. I was left alone, at home, knowin' Ma wasn't coming back and dad was, and I started thinkin' about him differently. His lab exploded, his fixes left me a robot Frankenstein, hell he killed Ma by being so damned stupid with his experiments – I didn't go out, just me with my thoughts and they went sour quick, and then he came home."

"Cy..."

"No," the sudden flare from the crimson eye almost knocked Beast Boy back a pace, the roles of earlier reversed as the shape-shifter was forced to see the deadly juggernaut his friend could and once had become, "don't B, you got your nightmares, this is mine. Anyway, he came back and he was just so damned _happy_ , threw his arms around me like it was the best day of his life and I, I just snapped, completely. Only missed my first shot because he heard it coming and hit the deck – I was screamin', can't remember what, damn near knocked the house down huntin' him through it. Ended up with him cratered in a wall and my cannon glowin' in his face – you wanna know why he's still here, why I'm not slumming it in juvie with the rest of the young trash we scrape off Jump City streets?" He didn't give them a chance to guess,

"Because he screamed I needed him, I couldn't fix myself if I went wrong. And he was right," dashing away tears the mechanoid swallowed hard, the taste bitter and burning as he relived that split-second where volatile heart had clashed with panicked brain and only just come off second-best, "I didn't know my own schematics, not back then. I dragged him, literally, the whole damn way to STAR labs, made him down load what he'd done to me onto my hard drive and left, never even looked over my shoulder – we ain't spoken since, just as well as I put him back in the ICU. Maybe it's not the same as you guys but it hurts the same, at least it hurts me," having not stopped moving he was in front of them both edging around the table, " you got more guts than I have and you're right, thinks won't be the same any more, they can't be, so I know where I'm standing, right damn here."

XXX

No-one said anything because no-one knew any words – none of them were the blessed Solomon, they could not force a genie, least of all one as diabolic as this, back into a simple bottle. Cyborgs' breath came raggedly but her forced himself to stay upright, following the examples of his friends and refusing to bow under his ancient guilt. All was still for an instant before Starfire's smile, watery but sincere, widened a fraction and she reached over the table to place a hand on his elbow, Beast Boy managing a thumbs-up as it took everything Cyborg had left not to break down and bawl like a child. He did cry, tears running down the living side of his face and speaking words that were currently beyond him; only at Beast Boy's sudden gasp did he blink them away to see the changeling staring bug-eyed across the room. Following his gaze and feeling Starfire lift off to do the same over his head he at first saw nothing different, then his jaw dropped as he finally twigged the thin strip of black and white dangling from a gloved fist,

"I hear a lot you know," Robin admitted and Cyborg could only marvel at how piercing his blue eyes were, a stifled squeak telling him Cyborg felt the same, "I know about the pool, that you bet I'm Batman's' son, or nephew, or his clone," Beast Boy managed a ruefully-embarrassed grin, "but I'm not. I've no blood-tie to hi; my parents, and me for what it's worth, were wrong place, wrong time – one of his enemies set a trap and they got caught in the cross-fire, tried to be heroes stopping a bomb and ended up dead, just me left. I, I don't even remember how I ended up meeting him; I got to Gotham hitch-hiking but must have done something to get his attention, probably something stupid – I, er, I know I was... under several influences, a lot."

"Dude..."

"Really?" His gaze was ice and Beast Boy shivered under it, shaking his head as he tried to explain his outburst,

"No, no I get it but, wow," he shrugged, palms apart in a gesture of shell-shock, "I'd never have guessed, hell I'd never have believed it – you're always so, just, Robin." Despite himself the team leader chuckled grimly, holding up his doffed mask,

"I didn't always wear this Gar, there was a boy behind it once," he admitted, gazing into the blank white patches that had been his windows for the world for so many years, "and luckily for him Batman found him before he could get himself killed. He took me in and trained me, why I still don't know, but anyway I was there and I was trained, hard, harder than anything I've ever done before or since. You've all heard he's a hard-ass, what you've hear is nothing compared to the truth – I was pushed, further and further, he demanded perfection before he let me near the streets and I took it. The man who killed my parents was out there, I knew it and I wanted that bastard, wanted him more than anything," the old hatred, more toxic and venomous than anything he'd ever felt for Slade, bubbled up in his mind but time and wisdom had rendered him almost immune to the seductive voice, "but Batman said no. He kept saying no, always, and every time I tried to leave he stopped me, my failures his justification he said and I hated him for it. I was on my own, hating myself for not being good enough, always failing; I couldn't sleep, couldn't keep food down, all my training was getting worse and making me feel so useless and, and in the end it, it just got too much."

"Oh hell," Beast Boy's voice was a whisper, his fear-shrunken expression almost white with dreadful recognition, "Rob I, understand; I've been close, the Patrol pulled me back. Did Batman...?"

"No," at Robin's shaking head the animorph fell silent, letting him go on, "it was someone else, perhaps the only person Batman's ever trusted with his private life. I was, I'd done some looking, found the back of the wardrobe door, there was a handle – I tied ties together; heh, it seemed so funny back then, tying ties; and noosed them, stood on a chair when the main door opened, I panicked and jumped, couldn't stop, not so close. He came in, saw me hanging there and I'll never forget his expression – it was like, like he half-expected it, half-seen it all before – he came close and, he was so calm, even as I was blacking out; he asked me if I wanted this, if I really wanted to die."

"And you said no friend-Robin?" Into those glowing, tear-flecked eyes the Boy Wonder gently shook his head, giving a soft, self-depreciating smile,

"Hard to say anything dangling there Star; I couldn't speak but he must have seen it, saw it in my eyes. He cut the tie around my neck, caught me as I fell and just, I, went to pieces," the memory was powerful enough to make him shudder, "he was holding me, never said anything. I don't remember passing out, next thing I know I'm waking up with a ton of grit in my eyes and Batman telling me to get breakfast; he never said anything about it or brought it up again and I'm grateful. Maybe it's one of the reasons we fell out in the end; he would never let himself break like that though God knows he's got reason to and I half-feared, half-admired him holding it in. So I get it," he hadn't realised he'd been walking forwards until Beast Boy was in front of him and his breath hitched as the changeling pulled him into a rough, brotherly embrace, "but I never saw it, for any of you and I'm so sorry..."

"Do the forgetting of that friend-Robin, we have all held secrets from each other," Starfire told him in no uncertain terms, tear tracks evaporating under the heat of her gaze, "you and friend-Cyborg have been most courageous to speak now."

"We had good examples to follow little sis," the second-in-command of the team grated, hand on her shoulder as he felt her start to rise slightly; _praise the Lord for that small mercy, she's at least confident enough to hover after this_ ; "we've all..."

"No," the voice that cut him off was soft but solemn, "not all of us."

XXX

Even as he'd spoken Beast Boy's gaze had fixed the sole exception to the current rule; bowed forwards, for all they could see of her Raven might have left behind a stick to hold up her cloak. The room went quiet, deathly still apart from the occasional sniffle as the most insular Titan was torn in so many different directions she was frozen, pinned like a bug beneath suffocating expectation. Her mine was churning, so many upheavals from the revelations of her friends spinning through her normally-ordered and collected thoughts they'd formed a maelstrom, her emotional core of Nevermore lost within the impenetrable eye of the storm. No calming sutra came to her lips, she could not hold back this tide; instead she was dragged along with it, buffeted hither and yon by the raw, powerful feelings even as. Below the surface, fouler things were being stirred to the surface, uprooted both by fear of and desire for the one thing Raven had never truly known.

For the first time in her life she faced a stark choice – the Titans, four others outcast from society in their own ways, had revealed sins she had never suspected and even now stood as one, united in their darkness as well as in their light. For a child who had grown up knowing her monstrous fate the idea of kinship was a siren song but even as the idea draped itself seductively over her thoughts a blanket of fear smothered it; delivering the end of days to this beautiful, fragile world made their misdemeanours seem as nothing. Raven stood upon the same precipice they had leapt from but her burdens felt so much heavier; if she jumped and they failed to catch her she would shatter like glass and that would be the end, the world's fiery fate would dawn years early. She trembled, almost feeling wind on her face and hearing pebbles skitter underfoot down the mental cliff she stood upon – she couldn't look at them, under the weight of her past and future she didn't have the strength to lift her head, she barely had the fortitude to whisper,

"You, all of you..." she licked dry lips, suddenly aware that the air had a taste, the pulse in her ears and echo; truly things were never clearer than when you stood on the very edge, "...I, I can't, I haven't..."

"You're controlled little sis, or other little sis," Cyborg said gently and the warmth in his voice was a dagger in her breast – would he speak so conciliatory if he knew she was the end of the world? "I lost it, Rob dug through rock bottom and..."

"No," she could hear no more, such kindness would kill her if it was given and then taken away; somehow her head came up, hood falling away to reveal reddened eyes, a blotched complexion, a face fitting for the bane of realities, "no I haven't, yet. But I will, I will," nails dug into palms and the pain in her hand was so much more welcome than the one in her heart, I am the end, I am his portal; I will destroy this world, and nothing can stop it."

There was silence as she'd expected, only the drumming of her heart and a sick, swooping feeling in her stomach as she launched herself into the unkno...

"Trigon."

"What?!" No-one paid attention to the settee cushions exploding, their attention fixed on Raven's disbelieving gaze, "How do you know, that name?" Beast Boy tapped his left ear,

"I have to walk past your room to get to the bathroom; you talk in your sleep," her face went crimson, not just because he'd outed an embarrassing habit but also because his eyes were piercing in a way she'd never experienced before, as though he was seeing her for the first time, "all I know is the name and that you don't like it. What does it mean Raven; please," he snorted, gesturing to the other Titans surrounding him, "none of us have a leg to stand on accusing you of anything."

"Friend-Beast Boy is right," Starfire added, solemn but sympathetic, "we are not going to damn you friend-Raven, you are our friend."

Something snapped, all present saw her expression disintegrate as though she'd been stabbed before Raven disappeared in darkness, four eyes opening where there should be only two as the common room was lashed by an eldritch storm. the others flinched but did not falter, standing firm even as a voice that was only half-mortal boomed at them from the nexus of the gloom,

" **I am no-one' friend!** " It seemed to echo off every surface, reverberating like a drum as the lights exploded and unsecured items were hurled haphazardly around the room, " **I am His Portal, conceived in agony to slake His lust for a new world. I am the harbinger, the Portal He will use to enter this dimension and take your world for His own – He will come to claim, He will come to sire the end of all thins mortal for He is Trigon the Terrible and I am his blood, His gem. Nothing I do will make amends for the last day, when the Portal is opened and He steps forth my purpose is complete and He will have no use for...** "

" _Shut up you four-eyed bint!"_

The world paused, all dimensions froze in disbelief as Beast Boy marched forwards and from the fury blazing in his face even the demonic figure seemed to shrink a little, detritus clattering to the floor around them all as the shapeshifter forced her to focus on him,

"Rage, I assume that's you?" Unaware of his shell-shocked audience the changeling glared up at the darkened hood, "Get Raven, actually get all of them, the whole crew need to hear this. Hurry up," he demanded, his fear of her destructive side banished by something he couldn't quite name, a mix of emotions he couldn't place as he folded his arms, "we don't have time for your temper-tantrum." All was still for a heartbeat before Raven seemed to deflate, descending slightly from her pillar of darkness as two of her eyes closed and the remaining pair slowly lightened to a pearlescent white,

"What is it?" Her voice was even more of a growl than usual but just made the changeling chuckle bleakly,

" _Now_ she listens to me; is that all of you? Good," completely unaware that two of his audience were having questions forestalled by Cyborg's frantic promises he'd explain about Raven's unique mindset later Garfield addressed his team mate directly, making his point perfectly plain, "you haven't done anything."

Her eyes shone brighter, a pair of searchlights scouring through his irises to sweep the meaning of his words from his brain, the guiding force behind them letting him know its earth-shaking findings a second later with an immortal, uncontestable decree,

"What?"

"Oh for – and you're supposed to be the smart one?" Beast Boy threw up his hands in frustration, "Think Raven, what's different about your story and ours, any of ours? Come on, it's not difficult, and while you're at it lose the doom and gloom, it makes you look more emo than goth." The eyes flared dangerously for a moment before closing, pastel grey skin emerging from the black as Raven came back to herself, her face giving nothing away as she squared up to the other Titan,

"You don't understand," she said, her voice soft but unrelenting, "I'm the end of the world, the apocalypse on legs. Nothing you've said comes close to destroying your whole dimension and I'm going to be the cause of ioowww!"

She never saw his hand move, just felt it as she stumbled back a step clutching her forehead and the chakra stone he'd flicked. Her accusatory glare, however, bounced off his disaffected, almost bored expression as he shook his head wearily,

"There are none so blind, or deaf in your case – listen, ignore your pity-party for one minute and just listen to what I'm actually saying. It's easy, hell I'll break it down for you; from what you've said Trigon, I assume, is going to destroy the world right? And he's what, some kind of monster, or an alien like Darkseid?"

"Right, and he's a demon."

"Okay fine, doesn't really matter what he is but he's going to use you, somehow, to do it, to cause Armageddon right?" She rolled her eyes, hiding the bitter spike of guilt that ripped through her emotions as she nodded,

"Again correct, so there's no..."

"God help me are you really that dense, do you really not get it," he exploded, Raven quailing back a pace as his temper gave, "you haven't bloody done anything! Have you, I don't know, started a cult to this Trigon guy?" The thought made her break out in goose bumps,

"Wha-no! I'd never...!"

"Offered up prayers or, or something to prepare for his coming?"

"No, no I couldn't..."

"Burnt offerings? Desecrated holy relics? Virgin sacrifices – actually scratch that last one, I'd be a goner already if you were," he chuckled as much at her gobsmacked expression as his own wit in the circumstances, "all of us, everything we've said and done Rae, it happened. Perhaps unknowingly," he gestured towards Starfire, "perhaps understandable," Robin and Cyborg, "but regardless it was done, we did it. You haven't," he said, clearly enunciating both words as he put a hand on her suddenly-trembling shoulder, "you might be his portal or whatever but not yet – you can't be damned today for what you might do tomorrow, least of all by people who sinned yesterday."

 _Okay, that sounded cool_ ; Beast Boy felt he could be justifiably proud of himself for that off-the-cuff motivational speech but held the self-praise in check, focussing instead on Raven's reaction. She still looked astounded but was pulling herself together, blinking rapidly as she assimilated his novel point of view,

"I..." she began, shaking her head as though punch-drunk, "I, never thought of that." _Never_ ; all the teachers, all the monks and nuns of Azar; _not once_ ; all her life she had been told how it would end, had done her best to do some good before it all came crashing down; _but I haven't summoned him yet, I'm not the Portal until that day. He's right_ ; it should have been salt on the pill but as she looked up at her irritating team mate she swallowed it regardless; _Azar help me but he's actually right. I, have no idea what to do now, should I be happy, or concerned or – ow!_ Jerked back to reality by another sharp rap to her chakra Raven glared at the changeling casually buffing his nails on his shoulder,

"Do you want to lose fingers?"

"Theeeeere's the Rae we all know and... absolutely respect-stroke-fear," he joked, jerking a thumb over his shoulder, "come on, you didn't really think we'd get rid of you did you? After everything you've heard we've done?"

"Getting rid of the end of the world incarnate – you'd not be the first."

"Well they're idiots, and for the record so are you."

The slander made all present gasp and the made herself glare poison at the shapeshifter, speaking through tightly clenched teeth,

"Say that again," the 'I dare you' went unsaid but Beast Boy was just about smart enough to pick up on it,

"Nope," he declared, popping the word in a way he knew infuriated her, "I'll prove it. This end of the world, when's it all supposed to go down?"

"B..."

"No," he forestalled Cyborgs' warning, "this is important, especially for Rae."

"Raven," she grumbled, though she couldn't quite look him in the eye as she continued, "it, I mean, I become the portal on my sixteenth birthday; I don't know how and don't know how to stop it, believe me I've looked."

"I believe you but really, sixteen? That's what, fourteen months from now – damn it Raven, Rob would have a plan to knock this Trigon guy on his backside after fourteen minutes but he's not a mind-reader. I get you've got this whole 'lone-wolf-who's-a-loner' thing going for you but really, you thought we'd kick you out for it? I guess so," seeing her shrink away his expression softened with benevolence and despite her long-standing animosity for physical contact he threw an arm around her shoulders, the sorceress jolting as though electrified at the touch, "come on moron, you're not going anywhere while I'm here. Honestly people who say Rob's stubborn haven't met you yet – now move your feet or so help me I'm carrying you up there no matter what dimension you toss me into afterwards!"

She couldn't deny him, she didn't want to, not anymore; just this once on this crazy night of lamentations she let Beast Boy guide her the last few steps into the mill of her team mates, these other broken, damaged children who would have her despite even her darkest sides. Her cheeks were wet but her heart soared, given wings by emotions she knew but could not name so rarely had she felt them this strongly. All was a blur, the Titans awash in a dizzying mix of grief, relief and adoration for themselves and each other but after a few moments a flash of green let her centre herself and she slipped out from where Cyborg was ruffling her hair to step towards it. As she'd suspected Beast Boy was all smiles and pounced towards her – the kicked-puppy look on his face as he ran chest-first into her outstretched palm was priceless,

"But, but Rae..."

"Garfield Mark Logan," she incanted the name as though it were a fiend she was summoning, "I will let you off this one time but you're still at the top of my to-sacrifice list. Call me an idiot one more time or if I get an itch in my jumpsuit I'm not expecting you will be cut from it, literally."

He blinked, blinked again then in space between blinks she was off the floor, lifted by his hug with joyous laughter in her ears; she stiffened, only just daring to hug him back as the others joined in the joke and he set her down,

"Way to go Rae, I'll have to go some to beat that. Come on, I'm starving; let's raid the cupboards and get something to eat."

XXX

Knowing their friends would likely have lost their appetites for Quorn stew after seeking out the HIVE Beast Boy and Starfire had cleared the table thoroughly; now, passing food and snacks hand to hand they piled high the table with a cold buffet and dived in. Perhaps what they had said and admitted hadn't sunk in yet, perhaps it never would but for now they were content to be around each other without words, without reminders of the dire topics they'd all just dragged into the light. The atmosphere was almost surreal for a time until, perhaps belatedly, echoes of duty sounded in the ears of their leader and caused him to stir, looking across at the instigators of this conflicted night,

"Any idea where the police will be here?"

"What, to pick up the squatters? We called it in as low-priority just after we called you, so should be soon enough."

"You did say meta pick-up? Good, won't have to loan them power suppressors," he remarked lightly, biting into an apple, "so, HIVE down, Tower secure, no scratches to the T-car and even a better alternative to tofu discovered – I have to say that turned out better than expected."

"I am apologising friend-Robin," Starfire had a mischievous glint in her eyes, "are you saying friend-Mark and I did a job that was good?"

"Not in so many words – if B's head gets any bigger his ears'll scrape paint off the corridors..."

"Hey!"

"...but yeah, you did a good job," he relented with a grateful sort of smirk, "actually you did two good jobs; Raven we can start planning for your issue as soon as you're ready." Despite herself the sorceress shivered before steeling herself,

"Many thanks Robin but, the League," the memory of being turned away was bitter, even more so as it was done on the advice of one skilled in only one aspect of the mystical arts, "they already know." An eyebrow rose before being dismissed with a shrug,

"They're not the only game in town," Raven noticed his glance at the other spandexed teen but chose not to comment, "anyway it can wait until tomorrow; we're having a night off."

"Oh, looking to turn in early Rob," there was a knowing grin on Cyborg's lips and as his eye flickered downwards the team leader suddenly realised what he was referring to and cringed, "have to admit it's a tempting offer."

"Cyborg!" Despite the mottling face the android was relentless,

"What, you should be flattered; she got plenty of attention in the HIVE and blew it off, must have been saving it for you," he clicked up a panel on his arm, scrolling the screen down quickly, "should still have her number here somewhere..."

"Do you want to end up on the scrap-heap?"

"Whose number does friend-Robin need friend-Cyborg?"

"No-one's Star," the Boy Wonder assured her, glaring death at the smirking older teen, "Cyborg's just trying, very badly, to make a joke." Unfortunately, this had the opposite of his desired effect and as her eyes sparkled with interest he could only brace himself for the worst,

"I would like to hear this joke friend-Cyborg."

"Me too, though don't forget jokes are my thing Cy."

"Only the bad ones."

"So cruel Rae."

"Raven, and someone has to deflate your oversized head."

"Too, too cruel."

"For good reason, but anyway what you two missed when you sent us on that wild HIVE chase was a bit of fraternising with the enemy..."

"I hate you so much."

"...actually you helped out Beast Boy, your little trick led to Robin doing his hero-thing and gettin' another crazy fan-girl; hmm, cat-fights with Kitten, wonder if we could sell tickets...?"

"All my hate, burning like a thousand suns."

"...But anyway, after he scratched the itch you shoved down her shirt Jinx was, ah, interested in him scratching another, if you know what I mean."

"What? I do... oh, _oh!_ " The redness streaked across Robins' cheeks was a red rag to a bull, "No wonder you were looking at an early night."

"And you two're looking at an early death," the Boy Wonder grated, though Cyborg was having far too much fun to stop now,

"You might be too, Jinx always came near the top in the Academy physicals; if she gets a squeeze on your pelvis might never recover. Does juvie allow conjugal visits these days?"

"Conjugal," Starfire rolled the word around her mouth like a boiled sweet, "what does that word mean friends? As it was adversary-Jinx is it rude?" All three boys swapped glances before one was first to act,

"Uh, I'll let Rob explain that one Star," Cyborg wheedled, knowing that the rush of winning this mental game of pin-the-blame-on-the-other-guy probably wasn't going to survive the retributive training Robin was going to force him through tomorrow, "all I'll say is it's the kind of rude that'd leave them both with smiles on their faces." Robins' expression would have sent Slade diving for cover but Beast Boy only snickered helplessly and slugged him on the arm,

"When the trailer's rockin' don't come a-knockin' hey Rob; guess Jinx wants to know if nice guys really do finish last."

Cyborg guffawed, gone in hysteria even as Starfire, not quite grasping the humour, giggled at the sight of Robins' hands forming a noose towards Beast Boy's neck. However his motion, in fact all motion ceased at another sound, one that made them all look over even as the one closest to the source relocated his tongue enough to speak,

"Did you just _laugh_?"

"No," Raven stated firmly, though the fact she was biting her lips and not meeting his eyes gave him the courage to push on,

"You sure? It sounded like it."

"Clean your pointed ears out then," she managed, shoulders pitching, "I do not laugh – ahh, don't!" The soft poke in the side elicited a harsh bark of mirth even as she grabbed the offending fingers and glared at their owner, though even as she did his expression disarmed her wrath. Rather than annoying or impish the changelings' countenance was suddenly understanding, the hand caught in her grip revolving enough to hold her hand palm to palm. Glancing from face to entwined hands Raven felt her cheeks grow uncomfortably hot, a strange lump in her throat as her team mate smiled at her tenderly before glancing around at the rest of them,

"Grab on, all of you," he held out his free hand and it was engulfed by Cyborgs' metallic paw, the humour or earlier draining; _no, that's not right – it's changing, maturing, it's not gone away_ ; even as the thought crossed her mind Raven saw and accepted Starfire's offered hand, noticing how warn the Tamaranean's flesh was compared to hers, "this is something Star said and it really helped. We're going to be all right," he intoned solemnly, looking around the table at his friends and their linked hands, seeing the sudden water reflected in his eyes reflected in each familiar face, and if he dreamt the slight smile and soft squeeze on his fingers from the girl sat beside him it was a good dream, he wasn't going to wake up from it now,

"We're all going to be all right."

A/N: I won't lie, this was hard to write. Not only am I a creature of habit who doesn't do his best work away from home, the whole route this challenge went down quickly went dark, fast; speaking of which, the challenge was:

Beast Boy and Starfire bond over something non-hero related and start sneaking around because of it.

The other three Titans realise they're acting strangely and leap to the wrong conclusions – Robin and Raven are jealous but hide it while Cyborg prepares to act as peace-maker.

The HIVE beat the Titans but Star and BB beat them because they're more used to working together.

The rest of the team find out why they've bonded and there are a few red faces all round – the team also admit to a few other home truths in the light of the reveal (unfortunately I missed bonus points by not having Cyborg admit to trying ballet in his youth to try and keep him light on his feet for football practice).

Jinx 'mock'-flirts with Robin and the team take the Mickey out of him for it.

The thing was when this challenge was made I immediately thought of Disney, just not the current 'everyone-wins-and-only-the-bad-guys-get-hurt-and-even-then-not-really' kind my younger family is used to. No, I'm talking about the Old Testament, for-every-smile-a-teardrop Disney, the one that had Bambi's mother shot, Mufasa trampled to death and Pinocchio's friends transformed into donkeys and sold into slavery, movies I watched growing up that would never get made today for fear of traumatising the little darlings. Kids don't really see those sorts of films today and because of that, I feel, they miss a very important lesson about life in general – sometimes even good people do bad things or have bad things happen to them. In this story all the heroes have done bad things, either by errors in judgement (Robin, though to be fair he did this in the show too via Red X), lashing out due to isolation and frustration, (Cyborg), being put in a place where the only way to survive is to do something horrible, either intentionally or otherwise (Beast Boy and Starfire) or blaming themselves for things they haven't done or are 'fated' to do (Raven).

The Teen Titan TV show, in my opinion since I've had a chance to do more research on the subject, was about as good at showing this lesson as cartoons have been recently; it's no Animals of Farthing Wood (seriously, we Brits do heroic tragedies like no-one else) but it touched on some very adult material including betrayal, unrequited verging on unhealthy love (Beast Boy for Terra) and PTSD to name a few but it did so sensitively. It also encouraged a new generation to read more deeply into the backstory of these characters, which is downright tragic for most of them. What I was aiming for in this fic was the idea that two of the Titans could bond over a very dark secret but realise their bond is impacting the team – from there, other skeletons could be turfed out of cupboards and the team was a whole could grieve and heal with each other; a burden shared, no matter how dark, is a burden lightened.

I understand this fic won't be to everyone's taste but I hope you understand what it was meant to show even if you didn't enjoy it (especially you sprouts, we'll watch some old Disney over Christmas, I promise, and I'll explain it all then). Until next time, however, back to work – hi-ho, hi-ho and all that...


End file.
